When will somebody throw consecutive no-hitters already?

Just a gut feeling: I voted never in our lifetimes. If you actually did the math (if you're the kind of person who knew enough to do it--I couldn't), it probably suggests otherwise. But I feel like there are factors that can't be measured that would gum things up. Primarily, just how nervous and tentative any pitcher who got anywhere close (to the 7th, say) would be.

On the other hand, I give it a better chance than DiMaggio's hit streak falling. At least with a second no-hitter, you won't be surrounded by 30 sportswriters after every out from the 5th inning forward.

Agree completely that breaking DiMaggio's streak is far less likely. I can't even think of a player from the past ten years, except for maybe Ichiro or Jeter, who would even be capable of breaking it.

I think the odds of Vander Meer's record being broken are way way higher than DiMaggio's streak falling, but I think it's entirely within the realm of possibility that it could be tied in my lifetime.

http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2012/06/unbreakable.html#more

to get to 511 you would have to win 25 games 20 YEARS in a row

I think he ignores the fact that you can also win 20 games for 25 years, much easier.

I tend to divide records/feats into three categories. The first are the ones like Cy Young's wins that are impossible under present conditions. The rest are those that leave a little wiggle room and those that don't. Hitting .400 or hitting 73 home runs is exceptionally difficult, but you can go two or three days without a hit, maybe even a week if you draw some walks, and Bonds went 13 games without a home run. Believe it or not, I don't rule out seeing a 30-game winner in my lifetime. Even at 35 starts, there's some margin of error--plus you can pitch not particularly well a few times and pick up a cheap win.

Vander Meer and DiMaggio have this in common: there's no margin of error. There is in a way, I suppose--you're allowed to walk a few guys, and you don't have to get a hit every time up--but in terms of giving up a hit (even a cheap infield hit) or going hitless, there's zero wiggle room. That's why those are the toughest to me.

last week joe maddon said something about how all the advanced metrics are, at the moment, anyway, really playing into the defense's hands. and i guess he should know, as the rays are shifting more than anyone else ever has.

with all the heat maps and graphed tendencies of hitters known -- along with increased bullpen use/loogys/etc -- a hitter trying to get to 57 games today has extra stuff going against him even apart from the media frenzy.

I was curious, so I checked Williams' game log for '41. His longest stretch without a hit was five games. He pinch-hit in three of them, though (why he was relegated to pinch-hitting, I don't know), so it was only an 0-11 run. As far as I can tell, Brett never went more than two games without a hit in '80, and in fact had very few oh-fers throughout the season (only one in July). Carew had a three-game stretch in '77, but again, he was a pinch-hitter in two of them; a mere 0-6 detour. Gwynn's '94 was like Brett's '80: maximum of two games, very few hitless games anywhere.

To hit .400, there doesn't seem to be as much wiggle room as I thought.

I think he ignores the fact that you can also win 20 games for 25 years, much easier.

There's also the Jamie Moyer route of 14 wins a season for 37 years.

I was curious, so I checked Williams' game log for '41. His longest stretch without a hit was five games. He pinch-hit in three of them, though (why he was relegated to pinch-hitting, I don't know), so it was only an 0-11 run. As far as I can tell, Brett never went more than two games without a hit in '80, and in fact had very few oh-fers throughout the season (only one in July). Carew had a three-game stretch in '77, but again, he was a pinch-hitter in two of them; a mere 0-6 detour. Gwynn's '94 was like Brett's '80: maximum of two games, very few hitless games anywhere.

To hit .400, there doesn't seem to be as much wiggle room as I thought.

― clemenza, Sunday, June 17, 2012 12:31 AM (6 minutes ago)

well you're selecting from a pretty small sample there of course. going ofer for 5 games and then going 4-for-5 for the next 2 pretty much erases this

brett not going more than ~6 AB without a hit is pretty insane though, if i'm reading your post correctly

even as a yankee fan joe d winning the '41 MVP over teddy is inexcusable

going ofer for 5 games and then going 4-for-5 for the next 2 pretty much erases this

But I'm really making the opposite point--even in those 5 games (three of which weren't games at all), Williams only went 0-11, so he never really had to dig himself out of a big hole. He never had a hitless week, say 0-20 with a few walks thrown in, like I speculated you could get away with earlier.

I was also curious about Verlander. He needed six more wins for 30 last year; were there six losses or no-decisions where he pitched well enough to win? Yes, there were. Putting aside any cheap wins he got (I count three), he had seven quality starts he didn't win. Four of them were right on the fence--six innings pitched, three earned runs. He also had losses of two earned runs in nine innings, and one in 7.2, and a no-decision of three earned runs in 8 innings. If he had picked up wins in six of those games, that would have been 30. I realize that that's catching almost every conceivable break. But it seems self-evident that to win 30, you'd have to; the point is, that's why I don't discount the possibility that one year someone might.

even as a yankee fan joe d winning the '41 MVP over teddy is inexcusable

Williams was ahead in bWAR, 10.1 to 8.6. Both of them were otherwordly that year, and DiMaggio set a record that might never be broken (which I believe was also the thinking at the time), so it's understandable.

1947 was inexcusable (9.6 for Ted and the Triple Crown, 4.5 for Joe).

A 30-game winner is definitely possible, we've seen pitchers with 14-15 wins going into the All-Star Break, it might be just a matter of time until someone's first half luck continues through the end of the year.

Cy Young's 511 wins is just from another time. Greg Maddux and Roger Clemens were both great forever and they still finished like 9-10 wins shy of Warren Spahn's 363 which is the highest post WWII. Nolan Ryan's 5714 K's are also just as freaky unbelievable too. Consdering pitch counts and the age of the six inning starter, I think the pitching counting records and 30 wins are pretty difficult. 30 wins could happen, but that would mean someone having like a Verlander like season last year and also having his club hit like a banshee when he pitches.

It will be interesting to see how close Jeter and Ichiro (counting his Japan hits) eventually gets to Rose's 4256 hits. I think hitting .400 or the 56 game hitting streak would be a monumental task in the age of the 24 hour news cycle. I just think the frenzy would be nuts, even if the guy played in someplace off the east coast/LA baseball grid. I think teams are more likely to intentionally walk key hitters now "that guys not going to beat me" perhaps than in the old days, although Ted Williams walked a ton, so maybe they did try to pitch around him much as possible.

"Nolan Ryan's 5714 K's are also just as freaky unbelievable too."

I don't find it unbelievable at all though. I mean Johnson basically didn't really pitch until he was 26-7 years old. Give him 3 or 4 150-200 seasons before that and have him hang around for another 1 or 2 after and he breaks it.

Actually I'm wrong. He pitched prior to then, but he didn't pitch particularly well. Still 25 is a pretty late state for a HoF pitcher was my point.

My guess as to why DiMaggio won in '41 (I'm not endorsing these ideas at all, just trying to figure out what voters were thinking): 1) The Yankees won, 2) they probably thought DiMaggio's glove made up for any offensive advantage Williams had (I grew up listening to Curt Gowdy and Joe Garagiola say things like "Brooks Robinson saves the Orioles 100 runs a year"), and, maybe, 3) DiMaggio's RBI advantage (although I think RBI veneration is more a '70s thing). I checked what they hit head-to-head, and it wasn't even close. The Red Sox were the one team who shut DiMaggio right down (.268/.373/.408); Williams, meanwhile, killed the Yankees (.471/.609/.632).

James has a method for deciding whether a record is vulnerable or not. He establishes a current league-leading norm, figures out how many years of that it would take to break the record, then designates it either likely to be broken, vulnerable, or safe. For a while he was saying the career doubles record was sure to fall, but I think he's moved it back into the vulnerable category.

Almost another perfect game last night! I'm curious about this stuff, so I checked out the follow-up starts to Koufax's, Ryan's, and Johnson's no-hitters (three guys who you felt might throw one at any time). Koufax's best follow-up was a CG four-hitter after his '64 no-hitter; Ryan followed his '75 no-hitter with a CG two-hitter; and Johnson had a CG five-hitter after his '90 no-hitter. So Ryan came pretty close--first hit was a two-out single in the 6th (some guy named H. Aaron).

i voted 'in our lifetimes' for whatever reason, tho i bet if you did the math it would support clemenza's vote

i voted 'It will never happen in our lifetimes' just so that i can instruct future generations in my will to visit this thread when someone does it in the distant future.

"Try not to be too annoyed by the way some guy named Clemenza always brought up Bill James."

A relevant "Ask Bill" from a couple of weeks ago:

bill, I am a HUGE Derek Jeter fan, and i have a friend who is always telling me there gonna go to the game where he has his 4000th hit, i always respond with a, "if he gets there" assuming he probably wont. what do you think his chances are of him actually getting there or even passing pete rose for most all-time?
Asked by: bill byrd
Answered: 6/5/2012

It's less than a 1% chance of getting 4,000 hits. He's an exceptional player, and you never know to what extent he'll be an exception to the rules about aging, but...even 3,500 hits is a bit of a reach from where he is now."

voted "never"

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I should point out that "lifetime" as it applies to me vs. as it applies to some of you probably means about a 20-30 year window.

now you've bummed me out.

clemenza and I should bet on which of us makes it alive to the end of Bryce Harper's career.

That's a clown bet, bro.

The way I look after myself, I'll be happy to outlast Pujols. Put your money on Morbius.

clemenza and I should bet on which of us makes it alive to the end of Bryce Harper's career.

― Pangborn to be Wilde (Dr Morbius),

where's the poll??

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Any way of getting word to Matt Cain within the next hour or so that there are two people who really believe in him?

Trout led off with a single. Just missed.

Pretty easy to guess which two dopes voted for him, imo. Xp grrr.

there are now 30 pitchers who have thrown multiple no-hitters

many of them are legends; some were merely good. and with each passing day, homer bailey is gaining ground on bill stoneman as the worst of them

Homer Bailey's been pitching for like twenty years and still only has a bWAR of 4.4 but good for him, at least he has another season left on a $105 million contract.

What's more likely, back-to-back no-hitters or homering in eight consecutive games? The first has been done once, the second three times, so I guess the home run binge. But I calculate the probability of someone like Morales homering in eight straight games at something close to 16,000,000 to 1. (He homers approximately once every seven games, so I used 1/7-to-the-8th-power...is that mathematically sound?)