Oakland A’s Daz Cameron (28) forearm bashes with Shea Langeliers (23) after Langeliers hit a two run home run against the Minnesota Twins in the bottom of the eighth inning at the Oakland Coliseum on Fri Jun 21, 2024 (AP News photo)
A baseball anomaly I do not recall ever seeing
That’s Amaury News and Commentary
By Amaury Pi-Gonzalez
OAKLAND– A’s Reliever Sean Newcomb recorded his first win of the year on Friday night with zero batters faced. So, how did he do it?
With the A’s trailing, 5-4, against the Minnesota Twins with two outs in the eighth inning and a man on first, Newcomb entered the game from the bullpen.
After getting to a 1-1 count, the left-hander decided to throw over to first, but the runner got in a rundown.
Eventually, Austin Martin was tagged out, which ended the inning. Statistically speaking, a batter is “faced” if the at-bat itself results in an out, whether it’s the batter or a runner via a fielder’s choice.
However, since Newcomb’s pickoff resulted in the out, no batter was “faced.
Then, in the bottom half of the inning, Shea Langeliers hit a two-run homer off Jhoan Duran to give Oakland a 6-5 lead.
So, with the lead, Oakland brought in their flame-throwing closer Mason Miller, and he recorded the save – thus giving Newcomb the win, despite throwing two pitches.
I do not recall ever seeing this unless my memory is just started to deteriorate.
I think this should be in the TV show Jeopardy.
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