Back in September of 1998, the "year of the home run", a rookie pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays named Roy Halladay was making his second appearance in the majors, starting against the Detroit Tigers. I have no idea why I happened to have been watching that particular game, not being a fan of either team, but it was on, it was baseball, and I watched it.
That day Halladay, who had won his first-ever appearance and first start by going five innings against Tampa Bay, set down the first twelve batters before Tiny Clark of the Tigers reached on an error. Clark would be stranded at first, and Halladay would take a no-hitter into the ninth, getting two outs before giving up a pinch-hit home run and ending up with a no-walk one-hitter.
The one-hitter was pretty shocking for a pitcher in only his second appearance in the majors, even against a poor Tigers team, and I recall it pretty well. Who is this guy, I wondered.
Well, "who this guy was" turned out to be a pitcher who would go on to a 203-105 career record and a lifetime 3.38 ERA. His 131 career ERA+ (a measure of ERA adjusted for park effects, that expresses a pitcher's performance against league average) means that for well over a decade he was over 30% better than a league-average pitcher. In nine of his 15 full seasons, he was over 40% above league average.
An intense competitor known for pitching complete games in an era when six innings is thought to be a good start, Halladay would go on to throw a regular-season perfect game against Miami and, in 2010, became only the second pitcher to throw a no-hitter in the postseason, for the Philadelphia Phillies against Cincinnati.
He won the Cy Young Award twice, once in each league, and was top-3 for the award five times. In a year he will be eligible for the Hall of Fame, and is a very reasonable candidate by most standards; an excellent candidate by mine.
On Tuesday, Roy "Doc" Halladay died when the small plane he was piloting crashed in Florida. Halladay was 40 years old. He had always wanted to fly, and so we can assume he was one who died doing what he loved.
We've no idea if Halladay, whose last season was an abbreviated 2013, would have returned to baseball in any capacity or would have simply flown off into retirement. Either way, his loss is a tragic and sad event for the world of baseball and those who follow it.
Roy Halladay never pitched for a team I rooted for personally, spending all his career with the Blue Jays and Phillies. But I always admired "Doc" and mourn his loss today in this column. "R.I.P." just sounds many decades too soon.
In coelo quies est.
Copyright 2017 by Robert Sutton