Being such a busy night, honestly, going into the 7th inning, I failed to notice what was happening on the scoreboard. And that was all the 0's across the visiting team, Modesto Nuts scoreline. Tanner Peters was not only was going to throw a no-hitter but this was going to a perfect game.
What is a perfect game and how rare is it? A perfect game is defined by Major League Baseball as a game in which a pitcher (or combination of pitchers) pitches a victory that lasts a minimum of nine innings and in which no opposing player reaches base. Thus, the pitcher (or pitchers) cannot allow any hits, walks, hit batsmen, or any opposing player to reach base safely for any other reason: in short, "27 up, 27 down". The feat has been achieved 23 times in the history of major league baseball—21 times since the modern era began in 1900, most recently by Félix Hernández of the Seattle Mariners on August 15, 2012.
A perfect game is also a no-hitter and a shutout. Since the pitcher cannot control whether or not his teammates commit any errors, the pitcher must be backed up by solid fielding to pitch a perfect game. An error that does not allow a batter to get on base, such as a misplayed foul ball, does not spoil a perfect game. Weather-shortened contests in which a team has no baserunners and games in which a team reaches first base only in extra innings do not qualify as official perfect games under the present definition. The first confirmed use of the term "perfect game" was in 1908; the current official definition of the term was formalized in 1991. Although it is possible for multiple pitchers to combine for a perfect game (as has happened ten times at the major league level for a no-hitter), to date, every major league perfect game has been thrown by a single pitcher.[credit: Wikipedia.org]
But this is MiLB! Unfortunately, I couldn't locate a reliable source for the number of perfect games within the MiLB but one place I found said 38 times. 38 times in over 100 years!?
Going into the 9th, Tanner faced Jared Simon of the Modesto Nuts and unfortunately, hung a changeup and Simon punched it into left field for a double. Tanner Peters received a standing ovation by myself and the Stockton faithful. A pitching performance like that doesn't come often and when it did, Stockton recognized this young man in his efforts.
Tanner Peters ranks seventh in ERA with 3.84 and he's 11-5. He's third in the Cal League in strikeouts with 132 while only walking 24 over 143 innings. The Ports scored 2 in the fourth, the only 2 needed, by an RBI from Tony Thompson to score Addison Russell and then a single by Antonio Lamas to bring in Thompson.
Meeting Tanner after the game, he's humble and soft spoken as a talented athlete at his position normally is. "Very, very pleased with that outing. Just proud of my team and everything, proud of myself, obviously. It was just a real quality outing. I'm very happy." Catcher Bruce Maxwell commented about his performance, "Tonight was just something special."
Little did they know what was going to happen tonight.
Tanner Peters
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