The man who wrote baseball history by throwing a perfect game in Game 5 of the 1956 World Series as a member of the New York Yankees, has waited 54 years to welcome the next man to the club.
Watch Roy Halladay no-hit the Reds
Tonight in the City of Brotherly Love, Halladay showed no mercy on the Cincinnati Reds, throwing the second no-hitter in baseball history, joining Larsen, who's perfecto defeated the Brooklyn Dodgers in that '56 Series.
In my preview of the series earlier today I noted that the Reds would be looking at the best pitching staff in the N.L., but I wasn't thinking about a no-hitter being thrown in a playoff series.
Now the Reds face a tremendous up hill battle, down one game to none, and facing another Roy, Roy Oswalt, in Game 2, still looking for their first hit of the series.
Halladay allowed only one runner to reach base in his near perfect game, walking the Reds Jay Bruce on six pitches in the fifth.
"I felt like we got in a groove early," Halladay said. "[Catcher] Carlos [Ruiz] has been great all year, but he helps me get in rhythm, throwing a lot of pitches for strikes, getting ahead, and then later in the game mixing pitches well, mixing speeds well. So he's done a great job for me, just trying to be aggressive."( Courtesy of mlb.com).
If throwing a post season no-hitter wasn't reward enough, Halladay also become just the 5th pitcher to throw 2 no-hitters in the same season, joining the California Angels Nolan Ryan in 1973, Virgil :Fire" Trucks of the Detroit Tigers in 1952, Allie Reynolds of the 1951 New York Yankees,and, ironically, Johnny Vander Meer of the 1938 Cincinnati Reds.
Tonight's accomplishment by Halladay is another example of why baseball is the grandest game of them all.
For 11 years Roy Halladay was as good a pitcher as anyone in big league baseball.
The Toronto Blue Jays never made it into post season play, a hazard caused by being left in the A.L. East behind the New York Yankees, the Boston Red Sox, and now, the Tampa Bay Rays.
11 years to pitch in the playoffs.
11 years to show the rest of baseball what he could do.
11 years, and the first time Roy Halladay takes the mound in a plaoff game, and he makes big league history.
Only in the grandest game of them all, the game of baseball.
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