For the Love Of The No No

Ah, the art of the No Hitter. Its a rare thing in baseball anymore, seeing somebody throw a no hitter. There have been now 307 such performances in a Major League Baseball game, with two coming in the last week. First was on April 9th when the Padres got their first no hitter thanks to Joe Musgrove blanking the Rangers 3-0. Then on the 14th, Carlos Rodon of the White Sox tossed a no hitter (and was nearly perfect) in an 8-0 win over the Indians.

What's so great about both of these games, is that its rare these days. Sure, we've had a few no hitters the last couple of seasons. But with the world of Analytics now, you don't see too many pitchers going the distance with complete games anymore.

With the Rodon no no, he threw 114 pitches on the night, and had it not been for Roberto Perez getting hit in the foot in the 9th inning, we could very well be talking about a perfect game right now. This is also the 2nd White Sox no hitter in as many years, as Lucas Giolito threw one last year on August 25th against the Pittsburgh Pirates. All this coming a few days after Joe Musgrove tossed the first no hitter in Padres history in the win over Texas on the 9th.

The takeaways from this rare feet are this: we never really see complete games in baseball anymore. The most in a season we've seen in the last five years in baseball in one season is six by Chris Sale with the White Sox in 2016 and nobody's done more then 10 in a season since James Shields threw 11 in 2011. As a matter of fact, Sheilds 11 is the only time since the turn of the century we've seen somebody hit double digits in complete games in a year. Look back at the 90's and that was almost common place to have double digits in complete games in a year.

That's one thing that grinds my gears about baseball now a days. Everybody is so worried about pitch counts its almost sickening. I get it that you want to save a pitchers arm and don't want what happened to Johan Santana after his 2012 no hitter with the Mets. At the same time, when a pitcher has a pitch count that is under 100 and he's going well through five or six innings, let him stay in. It drives most baseball fans I've talked to crazy. Just wish there was more distance out of pitchers and maybe some bullpens won't be as worn out towards the end of the season.