Category: Sportswriting

MLB No-Hitter Facts

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As of June 21, 2024, 284 no-hitters have been thrown in Major League Baseball, per Stathead, using this criteria: “From 1901 to 2024, in the regular season, requiring Hit Allowed = 0 and Runs Allowed =0.”

The first no-hitter was on June 30, 1901. Cleveland (Blues) played the Milwaukee Brewers before a crowd of 4,500. While the Brewers were hitless, Cleveland’s baserunners crossed the plate seven times during an afternoon in which the team got 18 hits but, surprisingly, just one walk.

In the Brewers’ lineup were four players whose first name was either Bill or Billy. Even more interesting is that the home plate umpire was the game’s only umpire.

The 1901 season was not a good one for the Brewers. Their game against the Blues was their 56th of the season and they were in the midst of an eight-game losing streak, one in which they had been shut out in their previous two games, their June 30th loss worsening their record to 19-36-1.

It was a no-hitter that, for many years, wasn’t.

SABR devoted an article to the game, explaining why. In it is stated, “This is the story of that confounding game and the baseball community’s century-long journey in finally recognizing Dowling’s gem as a no-hitter.”

One reason it’s “confounding,” according to its author, Gary Belleville,” is that “At the start of the twenty-first century, baseball’s consensus was that Jimmy “Nixey” Callahan had thrown the American League’s inaugural no-hitter, in 1902, and Bob Rhoads had tossed the first one for the Cleveland Indians franchise in 1908,” not Pete Dowling, who was on the mound for Cleveland on June 30, 1901.

After that game, Cleveland pitchers threw 12 more no-hitters, tying them for fourth place in most no-hitters thrown. One was thrown again on June 30, but 47 years later in 1948. Bob Lemon beat the Tigers 2-0, the Indians scoring both their runs in the top of the first on Lou Boudreau’s double.

After the game, Lemon’s batting average was .347. He finished the season with a .286 batting average, the second highest of his career, which was the same as Whitey Lockman’s and higher than Dom DiMaggio’s.

In Lemon’s SABR bio, Jon Barnes wrote that Lemon “was one of the best hitting pitchers ever in the majors.” He also pitched well enough to earn a spot in baseball’s Hall of Fame.

Mets Facts — June 21, 2024

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Sixty years ago, on Father’s Day, June 21, 1964 in the first game of a twin bill, the Phillies’ Jim Bunning no-hit the Mets at Shea Stadium, striking out 10 while walking none in the only perfect game ever pitched against the Queens men. It was Bunning’s first season with the Phils after being traded to them by the Tigers in one of baseball’s most lopsided deals.

Unfortunately for the home team, despite getting three hits in the second game they were again no match for the league-leading Phils, whose three runs in the top of the first were one more than then the Mets scored in the whole game, the Phillies sending nine batters to the plate before the Mets could get their turn in the batter’s box.

The day’s two losses put the cellar-dwelling Mets 21.5 games behind the Phils in the National League standings and 11.5 behind the next-to-last Milwaukee Braves.

At that point in the season, the Mets were the only NL team whose pitchers had yielded more than 300 runs.

At season’s end, their top four starters all had losing records:

StarterWL
Jack Fisher1017
Tracy Stallard1020
Al Jackson1116
Galen Cisco619

Since 1962, only 15 Mets pitchers have lost 16 or more games in a season and, only in 1964, did four do that. Further, in 1962, three accomplished that feat; in 1963 and 1965, two did.7

The last Mets’ pitcher to lose >= 16 in a season was Mike Torrez, who lost 17 in 1983 while walking 113 batters on a team that won only 68 games.

Mets Facts — June 20, 2024

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This season, Brandon Nimmo and J. D. Martinez are tied with the most hits (13) when they swung with a 0-0 count with the Mets. As a team, the Mets rank 13th in first-ptich hits, the Houston Astros first, per Baseball Savant.

Ninety-nine times since 1962, the Mets’ first batter in a game got a first-pitch hit on their first at-bat, per Stathead, with Jose Reyes getting the most, 17, and Jeff McNeil having the 3rd-most at 7.

McNeil is also one of three current Mets in the Top 10 of Mets with the most first-pitch hits, regardless of inning.

#3 is Jeff McNeil with 196.

#8 is Brandon Nimmo with 130.

#10 is Brandon Nimmo with 125.

This season, Jose Altuve leads the majors in 1st-pitch hits with 23. The most a Met has is 13 (Nimmo).

A Historical Look

The first Met to start a game with a first-pitch hit was Dick Smith in 1964. It wasn’t until 1988 that a Met did it more than once in a season, Len Dykstra accomplishing the feat four times. Lance Johnson broke that record in 1996, getting a first pitch, game-leadoff hit eight times, a feat Jeff McNeil fell one short of tying in 2019.

Only six Mets started a game with a first-pitch homer. Jeff McNeil was the last one to do it in 2019 and Jose Reyes the only one to do it twice.

Test Your Mets Knowledge

Which Met has the most hits on his first-pitch swings in all his at-bats?

Mets Facts — June 18, 2024

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Six Mets hitters had two or more hits in yesterday’s 14-2 win over Texas Rangers, led by Lindor’s four hits.

The Mets’ record is nine batters getting more than two hits in a game, done in 2018 in a 14-2 win over the San Diego Padres.

Unfortunately, the Mets haven’t always won the games in which they had a number of batters getting multiple hits. One such loss occurred earlier this year against the Miami Marlins on May 18.

Going into the bottom of the ninth, the Mets were ahead 9-5; then, the bullpen folded. In the game, six Mets batters had at least two hits.

For stat buffs, the MLB record for most multi-hit batters in a game for one team is 10, first set in 1922 by the Pirates and then repeated in 1925 by the New York Giants, both games against the Phillies.

Data source: stathead.com