Sunday, April 18, 2010

...And Then There Were Three

On Saturday night, Ubaldo Jimenez pitched the first no-hitter in Colorado Rockies history. His 4-0 victory over the Atlanta Braves left only three teams in the major leagues without a no-hitter. There are the Tampa Bay Rays, who have only been in the league since 1998 and the San Diego Padres, who have also never hit for the cycle since making their debut in 1969.

The third team without a no-hitter is the New York Mets. Although the Mets have 33 one-hitters to their credit, no pitcher has kept an opponent hitless while wearing the orange and blue.

Numerous pitchers have worn the Mets pinstripes and then pitched a no-hitter after leaving the team, such as Tom Seaver, Dwight Gooden, David Cone and some Texan with the first name of Lynn. Perhaps you've heard of him. He was also known for his ability to give noogies at a moment's notice.

Someday, a Met moundsman will pitch a no-hitter before he leaves the team. Until then, Mets fans will just have to settle for 20-inning victories where they couldn't figure out how to score until the position players started taking the mound.

Maybe they should just start a position player and he'll get the Mets their first no-hitter. Stranger things have happened and they usually involve the Mets in some way. After all, the Mets could have had Ubaldo Jimenez and weren't able to sign him back in 2000. Then again, if they had, there's no way he would have thrown Saturday night's no-hitter, right?

Don't get your hopes up, Padres and Rays fans. The Mets will get their first no-hitter before you do. The man who will do it has probably not been born yet, but it will happen. Count on it!

3 comments:

Coop said...

Two things - Greg Prince (as per usual) had a great piece about 4 or 5 years ago on the grand poobah of Mets Hell being Nolan Ryan, who was the underlord of the reason behind the Mets not pitching no hitters. The other is that with the Mets rich pitching history that no one has ever pitched a no -no. It will happen, it shall. Who knows? Maybe this year, and it will be Big Pelf (it's gotta be a home grown).

Ed Leyro (and Joey Beartran) said...

Knowing Jerry Manuel, Big Pelf will never get the chance to pitch a no-hitter because Dead Manuel Walking will say "I liked what I saw in the 20th inning and think I'm going to use him there more often".

Coop said...

OOPS my bad, Jason Fry wrote that. Bad journalistic integrity on my part. I think DMW might say that kid Mejia has the goods to be a specialty pitcher and Pelf can be a closer. Yeah that's the ticket. Anything to keep my job intact.