Domingo Germán has made history by pitching only the 24th perfect game in Major League Baseball history.
A perfect game is when a team’s pitchers (just one, as in Germán’s case, or a handful of them) make sure that no opposing batter reaches any base across at least nine innings. It’s as difficult as it sounds, requiring not just the pitcher to be on the form of their life but also the surrounding team.
But Germán and his Yankees colleagues achieved the incredible feat as they cruised to an 11-0 victory over the Oakland Athletics at the Oakland Coliseum.
“So exciting,” Germán told the YES Network after the match. “When you think about something very unique in baseball, you know not many people have an opportunity to pitch a perfect game. To accomplish something like this in my career, you know [it] is something that I’m going to remember forever, be part of history.”
The historic moment has come at a sad time for the Dominican star, who has recently suffered a bereavement in his family. “Unfortunately, two days ago an uncle of mine passed away,” he continued. “I cried a lot yesterday in the clubhouse. So I had him with me throughout the whole game. I was thinking about him… and it happened.
“This game is a tribute to him. He would have been so happy. He was always someone that really brought joy to our family, and it happened for him to watch it this way, from up there.”
Other MLB perfect games
Germán’s achievement is even more remarkable when you consider how old Major League Baseball is. MLB has been around for over 140 years and more than 235,000 games have been played since the first ball was pitched.
The first of the sport’s 24 perfect games came in June 1880 through Lee Richmond of the Worcester Worcesters before the Providence Grays’ John Montgomery Ward completed the second a week later.
Another two decades passed before Cy Young clocked up the third perfect game – for the Boston Americans – in 1904. It was the first of the World Series era.
Perfect games have become more common in recent decades, with 15 of the 24 arriving since 1980, but they’re still very rare. Before Germán, the most recent was Félix Hernández’s for the Seattle Mariners against the Tampa Bay Rays in August 2012.
The achievement comes after a difficult season for Germán. He has given away 17 runs in his previous two starts, and in May was given a 10-game suspension after contravening rules regarding foreign substances regulations.
It was adjudged that he used a sticky substance on his hands to get a better grip on the ball during a fixture with the Toronto Blue Jays. he had previously fallen foul of the rule during a game with the Minnesota Twins in April, but was only ordered to wash his hands to remove the substance, not ejected from the game as he was against the Blue Jays.
Max Scherzer of the New York Mets has also been punished for breaking the rule this season. He too served a 10-game ban.
Written and distributed by Chat T Sports.
