Ugh!

[David Watts]

John Means throws a no-hitter and misses a perfect game due to a guy reaching 1B on a wild pitch following a strikeout. I've already seen one article saying he was robbed and the rule allowing a batter to reach first in that manner needs to be done away with. Come on! This is part of baseball and just because it was inconvenient this one time you don't do away with the rule altogether. UGH!

[Reed]

Wild pitch, I guess he just has himself to blame.
I use to think a pitcher should get credit for a perfect game even if one of his fielders made an error allowing a base runner but now I think of a perfect game more as a team reward since the defensive players have to be perfect also.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by David Watts

John Means throws a no-hitter and misses a perfect game due to a guy reaching 1B on a wild pitch following a strikeout. I've already seen one article saying he was robbed and the rule allowing a batter to reach first in that manner needs to be done away with. Come on! This is part of baseball and just because it was inconvenient this one time you don't do away with the rule altogether. UGH!

Maybe we can have a first hit with 2-out in the 9th not count, just because... ...

Dave Stieb would like (not) that.

Sept. 24, 1988, Cleveland: Two out in the ninth and Julio Franco at the plate. He fouls off three pitches on a 1-2 count, takes ball two, then slaps a routine chopper ball that takes a godawful second hop right in front of Manny Lee at second base and skitters for a single.

Sept. 30, 1988, Exhibition Stadium: In Stieb’s next start, six days later, Baltimore’s Jim Traber flares a two-out hit curveball — “my third-best pitch instead of going to a fastball’’ over first baseman Fred McGriff’s glove into right. No no-no.

Aug. 4, 1989, SkyDome: Stieb is perfect through 8 2/3 innings, 26-up, 26 down, striking out 11. Two Yankee pinch-hitters go down swinging on nine pitches. That brings centre fielder Roberto Kelly to the dish. And — because this has become the story of Stieb’s life — he lines a sharp double to left. Afterwards, Stieb — called Cy by his ’mates, as in Cy Young (the eponymous award he’ll never win) — says, sighs, “If I haven’t gotten a no-hitter after three times, I doubt if I ever will.”

Three scotched 2-out-in-the-ninth, no-hit flirtations can break a guy’s heart.

[albatross11]

Originally Posted by Reed

Wild pitch, I guess he just has himself to blame.
I use to think a pitcher should get credit for a perfect game even if one of his fielders made an error allowing a base runner but now I think of a perfect game more as a team reward since the defensive players have to be perfect also.

Agree. The pitcher plays a HUGE part in a "perfect" game, but unless he strikes out 27 batters in a row, the shortstop has to "shortstop a perfect game; the right fielder has to rightfield a perfect game; etc. I think a "perfect" game would be one of those 27-pitch games you (never) hear about .

[Westheim]

Catcher defense has gone into the ******* gutter. Maybe Means wants to have a conversation with his glorified backstop with four flailing appendages.

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by RchW

Maybe we can have a first hit with 2-out in the 9th not count, just because... ...

Dave Stieb would like (not) that.

I'll always remember Milt Wilcox being one out away from perfection in 1983 against the White Sox. Jerry Hairston foiled that bid with a single to center.