New York Yankees pitcher Domingo Germán threw baseball’s first perfect game since 2012 on Wednesday night as he retired all 27 Oakland A’s batters he faced in order.
Germán’s perfect game is just the 24th in baseball’s long history and the first in MLB since Seattle Mariners great Felix Hernandez fired one against the Tampa Bay Rays on Aug. 15, 2012. It’s the fourth perfect game all-time for the Yankees; Germán joins David Cone (1999), David Wells (1998) and Don Larsen, who threw the only perfect game in World Series history in 1956.
Germán entered Wednesday night with a pedestrian 5.10 ERA and a 4-5 record, but he was dazzling against the A’s. He struck out nine and finished the game needing only 99 pitches to blank baseball’s worst team in an 11-0 Yankees victory.
His perfect game doubled as the first no-hitter of the 2023 season. This is the latest day on the calendar for the season’s first no-hitter since July 2, 2013, when the Cincinnati Reds’ Homer Bailey no-hit the San Francisco Giants.
Just six weeks ago, Germán was suspended 10 games by MLB for violating the foreign substances regulations during a between-innings check. Germán claimed at the time it was just “sweat and the rosin bag.”
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