On a humid 83-degree day in the nation’s capital, Dylan Cease was sweating through his San Diego Padres uniform, the maroon pinstriped shirt now more of a dark gray. The ninth inning had just begun, and Cease had yet to allow a hit. He had pitched 103 times, a total low enough, even in today’s game, to have a chance at completing the no-hitter.
Ildemaro Vargas battled through eight pitches, hitting five foul, before finally hitting second base. Jacob Young swung at a slider on the first pitch and routinely hit out to shortstop. CJ Abrams took a slider low and in and then swung at another, lifting a soft line drive to right field.
With that final out, Cease recorded his first career no-hitter (just the second in franchise history after Joe Musgrove did it in 2021) and completed one of the great three-game no-hitter streaks in Major League Baseball history.
On July 13, he allowed one hit with 11 strikeouts in six scoreless innings to beat the Atlanta Braves. Then, in his next start on July 20, he allowed one hit with 10 strikeouts in seven scoreless innings to beat the Cleveland Guardians.
Now, he's gone all the way, striking out nine batters en route to his first career no-no.
Cease, who pitched 8⅔ no-hit innings with the White Sox in a 2022 game before watching current teammate Luis Arraez break up the bid, said he started thinking about the no-hitter after the sixth inning, “but the pitch count was high, so it was like, ‘Uhh …’”
In the seventh, he walked to lead off the inning, but managed to get through the inning on 16 pitches. He told manager Mike Shildt that he still felt great, but thought he had to get through the eighth inning on 105 pitches. With an easy nine-pitch inning, he had room to get out in the ninth.
Remarkably, this was Cease’s sixth start this season of at least six innings allowing one or fewer hits. That’s a major league record: 10 pitchers, including Cease in 2022, are tied for second with four such games in a season. This might not be as impressive as it sounds; given that pitchers rarely throw complete games (or even eight innings), seven of those other 10 pitchers did so since 2021. Still, it points out how difficult it is to face Cease, especially his slider, which he threw 60 times Thursday. He leads the majors in strikeouts; hitters are hitting just .191 against him (though his ERA is a bit high for a Cy Young contender at 3.50).
Now, about that three-start streak. Saying Cease is one of the all-time greats is a little tougher, since you're comparing him to pitchers who, back in the day, would have thrown three complete games in a row. Still, he's the first pitcher to have three consecutive starts of at least six innings while allowing one or fewer hits. Let's list some of the other candidates, leaving the dead-ball era aside:
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Johnny Vander Meer, 1938 Cincinnati Reds (June 5–15): The only pitcher with two consecutive no-hitters, Vander Meer allowed three hits and one run in his start before the first no-hitter. But he also had 14 walks and 17 strikeouts in the three games. Average score in the three games: 84.7
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Sandy Koufax, 1963 Los Angeles Dodgers (July 3–12): Tossed three consecutive three-hit shutouts and racked up 26 strikeouts. Game average score: 89.0
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Koufax, 1965 Dodgers (Sept. 25-Oct. 2): As the Dodgers contended for a championship (they would win by two games over the San Francisco Giants), Koufax pitched two shutouts, allowed one run and struck out 38 batters in his final three starts. Average game score: 88.3
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Bob Gibson, 1968 St. Louis Cardinals (June 15–26): Gibson's season-best three-game ERA streak of 1.12: three consecutive shutouts with 26 strikeouts and 13 hits allowed (part of a five-game shutout streak). Average scoring per game: 86.7
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Nolan Ryan, Los Angeles Angels 1972 (August 22-31): Three consecutive shutouts, one of them a 12-inning shutout, raising his average game. Overall line: 30 IP, 13 H, 13 BB, 31 SO. Average game score: 89.3
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Dwight Gooden, 1984 New York Mets (September 7-17): The 19-year-old rookie pitched a one-hitter with 11 strikeouts and then two straight games with 16 strikeouts, one of them another shutout. Average game score: 87.7
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Randy Johnson, 1997 Seattle Mariners (May 28-June 8): Three consecutive scoreless starts, including two games with 15 strikeouts and just seven hits allowed. Average score per game: 89.7
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Roger Clemens, 1998 Toronto Blue Jays (August 20–30): Three-hit shutout, three-hit shutout, and two-hit shutout with strikeout totals of six, 18, and seven, respectively. Average game score: 90.3
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Pedro Martinez, 1999 Boston Red Sox (Aug. 30-Sept. 10): This was part of a ridiculous eight-start stretch in which Martinez struck out at least 11 batters in every start (107 strikeouts in 62 innings with a 1.16 ERA). He allowed one run in six innings with 11 strikeouts, no runs in eight innings with 15 strikeouts, and then one run in his famous 17-strikeout game against the New York Yankees. Average game score: 86.0
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Max Scherzer, Washington Nationals 2015 (June 14-26): One-hit game with 16 strikeouts, followed by a no-hitter with 10 strikeouts (he lost a perfect game when he hit the 27th batter), followed by eight innings of two-run ball. Average game score: 89.3
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Clayton Kershaw, Dodgers 2015 (July 18-Aug. 1): Kershaw was at his best. In this streak, he didn't allow a run in 25 innings with just 8 hits, 32 strikeouts and 1 walk. And in the game before this streak, he pitched an eight-hit shutout with 13 strikeouts. Average game score: 88.7
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Dylan Cease, Padres 2023 (July 13-25): Allowed two hits in 22 innings with 30 strikeouts and no runs. Average game score: 85.0
Subjectively, I'd probably go with the Scherzer trio, which includes arguably the most dominant consecutive games in history, although extra credit has to be given to Koufax for doing so in the final days of a heated playoff race in 1965. To me, Cease simply didn't play enough innings to earn recognition for the greatest three-start streak in history.
Well, not yet, but we'll see what he does next time.
