The Year of the No Hitter

In my “glory days” as a fast pitcher, I had quite a few no hitters and perfect games.  My windup was like a helicopter blade and my opponents weren’t paid baller dollars to go up against me.  A no hitter in the major leagues is not quite as common but lately, it’s seemed like there is one (or at least a close attempt) every other night.  Are pitchers becoming that much more aggressive or are batters just missing their GHB?  5 no-hitters so far this year:

  1)April 17^th: Ubaldo Jimenez, Colorado at Atlanta 4-0 (a total team effort; great defense and he didn’t start racking up K’s until the 6^th inning)

2) May 9^th: Dallas Braden*, Oakland vs. Tampa Bay 4-0 (I know, who?  His only previous claim to fame was a one-sided argument against A-Rod that late night talk shows had a field day with)

3) May 29^th: Roy Halladay*, Philly at Florida 1-0 (earned it)

4) June 26^th: Edwin Jackson, Arizona at Tampa Bay 1-0 (149 pitches!  Most ever for a no-hitter, and 8 walks!)

5) July 26^th: Matt Garza, Tampa Bay vs. Detroit 5-0 (bound to happen some time with Garza)

And a few games that were 1 inning from being no-hitters:

 1) June 2^nd: Armado Galarraga*, Detroit vs. Cleveland 3-0; Jason Donald hit a two out single to first base (bonus points for not going for ump Jim Joyce’s jugular after the botched call)

2) June 13^th: Ted Lilly, Cubs vs. White Sox 1-0, pinch hitter Juan Pierre no-out single up the middle

3) July 10^th: Travis Wood*, Cincinnati at Philly 1-0 in 11 innings, Carlos Ruiz no-out double to left center field

4) August 8^th: Brandon Morrow, Toronto vs. Tampa Bay 1-0, Evan Longoria two-out single to 2^nd base

* perfect game (or PG attempt)

Even if history books won’t technically recognize it (couldn’t we just asterisk it like steroid-enhanced home run records?), Galarraga counts as the sixth no-hitter so far this year in my book.  And while some of these pitchers have been dominant on the mound in the past, in the games just prior to each of those no-hitters, these six had a losing record and opposing batters got 1.42 hits per inning against them, about twice the average.  They also combined for an average 6.27 ERA, two runs about the total MLB average.  And while they usually pitched better than that the subsequent game after their no-hitter, they performed about twice as good on an overall pitching scale during their no-hitter than they average for all other games.  So basically, ordinary guys having an extraordinary day.

And if you haven’t yet noticed, Tampa Bay is up there more than most teams.  They’re also the only MLB team to be no-hit in 3 games within 12 months, the two above and one against White Sox pitcher Mark Buerhle on July 23, 2009. 

Other cool stats:

-Record setting no-hitter year?  Gotta go back to 1884 at 8 games.  7 no-hitters were thrown in each 1990 and 1991. 

-The longest time between modern era (after 1901) no-hitters is 3 years, 44 days between Bobby Burke on August 8, 1931 and Paul “Daffy” Dean on September 21, 1934.

-The greatest number of games played between two no-hitters is 6,364 between Randy Johnson’s perfect game on May 18, 2004 and Anibel Sanchez’s no-hitter on September 6, 2006.

-Only two current MLB teams have not had a pitcher toss a no-hitter: the San Diego Padres (41 years) and the New York Mets (48 years).  The Washington Nationals four no-hitters all occurred when they were known as the Montreal Expos, so not quite sure those count…

I guess barring any raging outbursts from Ozzie Guillen or bench clearing brawls, the no hitter is the next most exciting thing baseball has this year.