Ryu nearly throws a Mother’s Day no-hitter in another scoreless gem
by Rowan Kavner
The possibility that history could be made on a Mother’s Day Sunday afternoon at Dodger Stadium, with Hyun-Jin Ryu’s mom among the 45,667 fans in attendance, started to seem real when Cody Bellinger picked up the ball laced to him in right field off the bat of Stephen Strasburg and fired to Max Muncy at first base.
Four innings prior, Bellinger warned Muncy if he got a line drive while playing in on Strasburg he would be throwing the first baseman’s way. When the sixth inning arrived, with Michael A. Taylor at the plate, Bellinger looked up at the scoreboard and noticed Ryu hadn’t allowed a hit. A strikeout started the inning, when Strasburg stepped to the plate.
“It was the perfect opportunity for it,” said Bellinger, whose play would’ve been remembered forever had Ryu been able to finish off the no-hitter in a 6-0 win.
The throw erased what would have been the Nationals’ first hit of the game, though just barely. Initially, Bellinger thought Strasburg was safe. Ryu thought he was out.
“When they were showing the replay, I actually asked Max what he thought because he was closest to that play,” Ryu said through an interpreter. “He told me he wasn’t sure.”
Replay review confirmed the call, keeping the no-hitter intact. It was that moment, Corey Seager and pitching coach Rick Honeycutt said, when it started to feel like Ryu could really pull it off.
“I was like, ‘This might be the day,’” Honeycutt said. “Not every day you get a 9–3. That was pretty special.”
A groundout followed, increasing the no-hitter to seven innings. For much of Sunday, it seemed Ryu’s pitch count might be the only obstacle in the way of history. Ryu was at 73 pitches following a scoreless fifth inning that ran his scoreless innings streak to 21 straight, making it the longest active scoreless streak in the Major Leagues. He was at 90 pitches after the sixth inning, which included Bellinger’s spectacular throw.
“He made a huge play and kept the no-hit streak going,” Ryu said. “Honestly I want to say sorry to him, because I could’ve accomplished something thanks to that play.”
He nearly did.
After a perfect seventh inning that included two strikeouts, manager Dave Roberts didn’t see any stress in Ryu and called it an easy decision to send him out for the eighth. Roberts said he was just hoping for an efficient eighth inning to be able to send him out for the ninth. If Ryu kept the no-hitter intact, he believed he would’ve let the lefty get somewhere into the low-120s in pitch count.
“Fortunately, I didn’t have to make that decision,” Roberts said. “But it was really fun to watch.”
Ryu struck out his first batter of the eighth before Gerardo Parra — whose grand slam made the difference in the game a night prior — sent Ryu’s 105th pitch of the day deep toward left-center field. Ryu looked first at catcher Russell Martin, then toward the outfield, briefly putting his hands on his knees and staring out as if he could will the ball into Chris Taylor’s glove. Groans reverberated throughout Dodger Stadium as the ball bounced down and over the fence for a ground-rule double. The sounds quickly changed to applause, followed by a standing ovation.
Ryu didn’t throw the Dodgers’ first no-hitter since the combined effort last May 4, 2018 — or their first solo no-hitter since Clayton Kershaw’s on June 18, 2014 — but he did run his scoreless innings streak to 24 straight with eight scoreless innings on a career-high 116 pitches. Kenley Jansen finished off the one-hitter.
“I can’t say enough about Hyun-Jin and what he’s done for us,” Roberts said. “He’s off to obviously a tremendous start. To watch him work as a technician, it was masterful. It really was.”
Sunday’s start hardly came out of nowhere.
Ryu is now 5–1 with a 1.73 ERA and 0.73 WHIP with 54 strikeouts and three walks through eight starts this year. Since April 10, 2018, he leads the Majors (minimum 100 innings pitched) with a 1.71 ERA.
In his last three starts, he has allowed one run in 25 innings.
“He never tries to do too much of the same thing to the same guy,” said Honeycutt, who credits Ryu’s cutter as the final piece to an already spectacular repertoire to help him reach this point. “He has enough weapons that he can vary pitches to both sides of the plate.”
Ryu said he might have been more upset about what happened in the fourth inning than the eighth.
In his previous start — a shutout win in which he allowed four hits in his nine innings — he was perfect through his first five innings. On Sunday, he was perfect through three before allowing a walk to Brian Dozier in the fourth. It was the first walk Ryu issued at home since Aug. 26, 2018, snapping a streak of 218 straight plate appearances without a free base.
But he wouldn’t let that walk or the minimal run support against Strasburg faze him. The Dodgers didn’t get their first hit off Strasburg until a Justin Turner single in the fourth inning, despite Bellinger reaching in each of his three plate appearances against the righty. They scratched two runs across on Strasburg — one on a sacrifice fly and the other on a groundout — in six innings.
The help would come late. After Ryu’s final scoreless frame, Seager lifted his second career grand slam in the eighth inning — exactly one month after his last home run.
That would be plenty for Ryu, who has now won each of his last seven regular season home starts, the last of which was particularly special.
“It feels great to pitch well in front of my mom on Mother’s Day,” Ryu said. “Actually my dad’s birthday is coming up, so I probably have to pitch like this again.”
