Reds-Phillies: Roy Halladay Does the Unthinkable, Throws a Playoff No-Hitter

I don’t think there enough adjectives out there to describe the pitching performance given by Philadelphia Phillies ace Roy Halladay on Wednesday.

Awesome, incredible, spectacular, or whatever word you want to use, the fact is Halladay was simply amazing.

Halladay pitched the second no-hitter in postseason history as the Phillies defeated the Cincinnati Reds 4-0 in Game 1 of their NLDS series.

Halladay walked one and struck out eight in nine innings of work. He joins Don Larsen as the only two pitchers to throw postseason no-hitters. Of course, Larsen’s gem was a perfect game.

Halladay also joins Johnny Vander Meer, Allie Reynolds, Virgil Trucks, and Nolan Ryan as the only pitchers to throw two no-hitters in a single season.

As I watching this game, I don’t recall ever watching a baseball game where one team—in this case the Reds—didn’t hit a ball hard all night. Don’t get me wrong, Halladay was great, but this was a feeble performance by the Reds.

There wasn’t even a threat of a hit against Halladay. Halladay just carved them up inside and out, and I am not sure he even broke a sweat in doing such.

Halladay threw first pitch strikes to 25 out of the 28 batters he faced and only threw 25 balls out of the 104 pitches he threw. He was beyond video game good.

As for the Reds, is there anything positive they can take out of this game for Game 2? I will be the bearer of good news and say there were two positives.

For one, it can’t get any worse. The Reds officially hit the bottom of the barrel in Game 1. They can only go up from here.

Second, their bullpen was actually really good tonight. After Edinson Volquez gave them 1.2 innings of semi-useless baseball, Travis Wood, Logan Ondrusek, and Bill Bray pitched 6.1 of one-hit baseball. Dusty Baker also didn’t have to use Aroldis Chapman tonight, so he could potentially use him for two innings on Friday.

Once again, congratulations to Mr. Halladay. You are truly one of the greatest pitchers I have ever seen. Just amazing.

Game 2 will be Friday night at 6:07.

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