Corey Kluber Pitches No Hitter! Yanks 2 Texas 0 on 5-19-21

Corey Kluber pitched a no hitter. That’s the tweet. That’s the article. He no hit Texas on a Wednesday night in Texas — a team and a ballpark that have given other Yankee pitchers trouble. And Tyler Wade came in late as a replacement player, and got the game winning hit, and made some terrific plays in right field.

Details:

1. Kluber’s No Hitter

Corey Kluber struck out 9 and threw 101 pitches for the no hitter, improving his record to 4-2 2.86. The game was 0-0 through 5 innings, with Cleveland’s Hyeon-Jong Yang matching Kluber’s brilliance by shutting down the Yanks.

In the 6th, Tyler Wade tripled in a go ahead run and then scored to get the Yanks a 2-0 lead (described below) and that was all Kluber needed.

With 2 outs in the bottom of the 8th, Isiah Kiner-Falefa hit a drive to right that Tyler Wade made the catch on, or as John Sterling put it on the radio, “SWUNG ON, DRIVEN TO RIGHT FIELD, THERE IS… WADE FOR THE CATCH.”

The 9th inning started with Charlie Culberson hitting a SHOT to 2nd that DJ LeMahieu short hopped and threw to 1st for the out. PHEW. With 1, pinch hitter David Dahl hit a line drive to right that looked like trouble, but Tyler Wade again was there. PHEW.

Willie Calhoun then grounded out to shortstop and the no hitter was complete.

Kluber’s Back Story

After winning 2 Cy Youngs in a brilliant 8 year career with the Cleveland Indians, when he was regarded as one of the aces in the game, Kluber was traded by Cleveland to Texas in December 2019 for Emmanuel Clase and Delino DeShields. He made one start with Texas, last year, pitching 1 inning in a start, and suffering a grade 2 tear of the teres major muscle in the back of his right shoulder — missing the rest of the season.

The Yanks gave him a 1-year contract at $11 million, taking a chance that Kluber at age 35 wasn’t done. So far it has paid off big time, as Kluber joins Gerrit Cole to give the Yankees 2 aces (and Domingo German isn’t that far behind as #3 starter).

When asked what it meant to pitch the no hitter after the game, Kluber — who has been nicknamed Klu-bot because he pitches and talks like a robot — said “It was fun.”

2. Wade the Offensive and Defensive Hero

Ryan LaMarre pulled a hamstring running to first in the 2nd inning. He was replaced in right field by Tyler Wade. It is ironic because Wade made the two terrific catches on line drives to right described above — and it was 2 years ago that the Yankees went out and acquired Mike Tauchman because they needed a ‘real outfielder’ — even though Wade had been playing outfield for them in Spring training. Wade was sent down to the minors at the start of the 2019 season, with Tauchman taking his place as a Yankee outfielder.

But Tauchman is gone and here is Wade making catches on drives to right to keep no hitters in tact.

And there was Wade in the 6th inning with an RBI triple scoring Kyle Higoshioka who had walked to lead off the inning. Wade scored on a DJ LeMahieu sac fly to make it 2-0 NY and ballgame.

Etcetera

The Yankees got 4 hits:

  • Wade hit the game-winning triple.
  • Gleyber Torres was back at shortstop after being out due to testing positive for COVID, and went 2-2 with a walk to raise his average to .246.
  • Aaron Judge went 1-4; he’s at .294.
  • Kyle Higashioka walked 2 times and scored the game winning run, besides catching the no hitter.

The Boxscore

https://www.espn.com/mlb/boxscore/_/gameId/401227694

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*