Monday, May 10, 2010
Dallas Braden, a left-handed pitcher for Major League Baseball‘s Oakland Athletics in the United States, became one of only nineteen players in the history of the MLB to pitch a perfect game, in a 4-0 win against the Tampa Bay Rays. Braden, aged 26, who retired all 27 batters consecutively on 109 pitches, also earned his first career complete game. In the process of throwing the perfect game, Braden also struck out six Tampa Bay hitters.
The perfect game was the second pitched in the Athletics’ franchise history, the other being thrown by Hall of Fame pitcher Catfish Hunter on May 8, 1968 against the Minnesota Twins. Braden, at 26, also became the youngest pitcher to throw a complete game since Anaheim Angels pitcher Mike Witt did so at age 24 in 1984.
The low crowd at the Oakland Coliseum, at only 12,228, was due to the Mother’s Day holiday occurring across the United States, Braden, along with every other Major League Baseball player, donned pink equipment for awareness of breast cancer, which has become a tradition for baseball players on Mother’s Day. Braden’s own mother died of skin cancer when he was a senior in high school, but his grandmother attended the game.
Braden recently drew controversy in the league after publicly criticizing New York Yankees all-star third baseman Alex Rodriguez for crossing the pitcher’s mound after a foul ball, which Braden claimed to be an “unwritten rule” in baseball. When asked about the no hitter, Rodriguez simply responded, “Good for him, he threw a perfect game. And even better, he beat the Rays,” he said, as the Rays lead the American League East division, the same division that Yankees play in.
“Mother’s Day hasn’t been a joyous day for me in a while. But to know that I still get to come out and compete and play a game on that day, that makes it a little better. With my grandma in the stands, that makes it a lot better. To be able to give her this today was perfect…,” said Braden in a post-game interview with MLB.com.