HOUSTON ASTROS
Houston Astros

Led by a brilliant Christian Javier, Astros seal a combined no-hitter vs Yankees

The Houston Astros achieved a nearly impossible feat

Christian Javier - Houston Astros
Christian Javier - Houston AstrosAP

Even though a perfect game is arguably one of the rarest feats in baseball, a ho-hitter is also quite the event. This season, the Houston Astros just completed a feat they hadn't done since September, 2019. On Saturday afternoon, the Astros were initially led by Dominican pitcher Christian Javier. He registered a career high 13 players who struck out over 7 innings against the New York Yankees.

Where things became more interesting was after Javier could not continue and Hector Neris took over him. He aalowed two baserunners in the eighth via walk, but forced a deep flyout from Joey Gallo. Astros coaching staff offered Pressly his chance to shine and he didn't disappoint with closing the ninth inning perfectly. A rare combined no-hitter that almost never happens in baseball.

For Houston, Matijevic and Altuve got a home run each while Kyle Tucker scored an insurance run at the top of the ninth to secure that win. But out of all the players who made a difference this evening, Javier was deinitely the brightest one of the bunch with his 13 strikeouts in seven innings.

Baseball sometimes gives us brilliant moments like the one people witnessed on Saturday at Yankee Stadium. As the team with the most wins in this MLB season, this was definitely a humbling experience for the New York Yankees. Astros lead the West in the American League, which means this win is not that surprising for them.

How rare is a combined no-hitter in the MLB?

As we've said before, a no-hitter is a feat that tends to happen a couple of time per year in the MLB. Before this Saturday, only 316 no-hitters have taken place in the sport's history. However, the vast majority of those were finished by the starting pitcher. Where things get more interesting is with combined no-hitters, which happen only every red moon. Since the beginning of this league in 1876, there had only been 17 combined no-hitters.

The oldest one dates to the times when a young Babe Ruth was still playing for the Boston Red Sox in 1917, almost exactly 105 years ago. The most recent was this past April when the Mets beat the Phillies 3-0. Today's event marks the combined no-hitter number 18 in MLB history. What's even stranger is that we've seen three consecutive years with two combined no-hitter per season.

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