How unbelievably awesome was Clayton Kershaw’s no-hitter against the Rockies? According to Fangraphs’ Dave Cameron, it was “the most perfect non-perfect game.”
Because Hanley Ramirez sucks at playing defense, baseball will not officially recognize Clayton Kershaw‘s effort tonight as a “perfect game”. But I would like to submit that if this doesn’t qualify as a perfect game, nothing should. . . .
Clayton Kershaw did not retire every single batter he faced tonight, so technically, he wasn’t perfect. Screw technicalities, though; what Clayton Kershaw just did was far more impressive than going 27-up, 27-down and relying on your defense in order to do it. Clayton Kershaw just threw one of the most dominant performances in the history of baseball.
In the top of the seventh inning, Ramirez, who was playing with a sore right thumb, fielded a softly hit ground ball cleanly but threw wide of first for an error.
According to Elias Sports Research, Kershaw became the first pitcher in history to record as many as 15 strikeouts without allowing either a hit or walk. Accordingly, it’s not a surprise that his game score of 102 is the second highest in a century, behind Kerry Wood’s 20-K performance in 1998.