2021 No. 2 ranked no-hitter: Joe Musgrove vs. Texas Rangers, April 9
How young we were! Such summer children. When Joe Musgrove threw a no-hitter against the Rangers on April 9, we had no idea what was to come.
What came was five (ahem, actually six) no-hitters over the next six weeks.
Musgrove got us started strong. His game score of 97 ranks as the second-best in this exercise.
He struck out 10. He didn’t walk any. He needed 109 pitches. He was pretty good.
Musgrove went just one batter over the minimum, hitting Joey Gallo in the fourth inning before getting the next 16 batters out to end the game.
Like Miley, Musgrove didn’t have a cakewalk. The Padres won 3-0, though it was a little less stressful. Per FanGraphs his WPA was .463. A lot. But not a LOT.
There is naturally one piece of this game appealing to a true aesthete: it was a little extra historic.
The Padres were the last franchise in MLB without a no-hitter entering this year. Musgrove closed the books on the stat, and it will remain closed forever, or until MLB expands to Portland.