Clayton Kershaw was two innings away from a potential perfect game against the Twins on Wednesday when Dodgers manager Dave Roberts elected to play it safe and pull the 34-year-old star. Fans on social media are not happy about the decision, especially considering Kershaw had thrown just 80 pitches on the day.
Kershaw sat down 21 straight Twins to open the game, fanning 13 in a masterful outing. Given Kershaw’s recent injury issues, and the fact that the entire baseball world is still ramping up after a truncated spring training following the league’s lockout, Roberts’s decision is understandable, if disappointing.
Dodgers reliever Alex Vesia handled the eighth inning and surrendered the team’s only hit to catcher Gary Sánchez. Justin Bruihl was perfect in the ninth, capping the team’s one-hitter in a 7–0 win.
Fans are still buzzing about the controversial decision to pull Kershaw, who does not have a perfect game in his career. He threw a no-hitter in 2014, the same year he won his third and most-recent Cy Young Award.
We’re nearly a decade removed from baseball’s last perfect game, thrown by Mariners star Félix Hernández in August 2012.
Los Angeles’s only perfect game came in September 1965, when Sandy Koufax fanned 14 White Sox in a 1–0 game.
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