Spencer Turnbull Authored the Latest of Many No-Hitters

It’s time to proclaim 2021 the Year of the No-Hitter.

At the beginning of April, Joe Musgrove graced us with an electric performance versus the Rangers. Just five days later, Carlos Rodón announced his resurgence by shutting down Cleveland. John Means then tossed a near-perfect game against the Mariners, and Wade Miley followed in Rodón’s footsteps, handing Cleveland another no-hit night. That brings us to yesterday, when Spencer Turnbull became the latest pitcher to go the distance, striking out nine Mariners while allowing just two baserunners via a pair of walks.

That’s an almost unfathomable five no-hitters – and we’re still in the month of May. Since 1901, the only other season with at least five such games before June was 1917, a year that falls in major league baseball’s Dead Ball era. There were six total no-nos that year, all thrown prior to June, but it doesn’t feel like the string of no-hitters will come to a stop this time around. Though the league’s offensive environment is certainly livelier now compared to a century ago, pitchers of all sizes, deliveries, and repertoires are throwing harder and smarter than before. In addition, a greater emphasis on power has seen hitters whiffing at higher and higher rates, sacrificing contact for big hits. The modern record for the most no-hitters in a single season is seven, which occurred in 1990, 1991, and 2012. We are on track to obliterate it.

On a more granular note, the Seattle Mariners give opposing pitchers one of the better chances at authoring baseball history. Coming into the game against Detroit, they collectively carried a 89 wRC+, the eighth-lowest mark in baseball. At the conclusion of Turnbull’s masterful performance, the team’s batting average dropped below .200, the worst in the majors. Mariners hitters have struck out in 26.3% of their plate appearances, but the main issue is they just aren’t performing well – that goes for regulars (Dylan Moore) and recently demoted prospects (Taylor Trammell) alike.

Still, a no-hitter is an accomplishment regardless of the run environment or opponent, and we should celebrate that. Today’s protagonist is Turnbull, the 28-year-old righty for the Detroit Tigers. After a brief call-up in 2018, Turnbull settled into the Tigers’ rotation the following year, contributing a solid 3.99 FIP across 148.1 innings. His 2020 season looked similar in terms of results and demonstrated that his previous efforts weren’t a fluke.

Turnbull, however, had a few issues to address. For one, his 10.5% walk rate between 2019-20 was on the higher side. And despite a groundball rate of 48.7% during that same span, he had a tendency to allow hard contact. But so far in the 2021 season, Turnbull seems to have made improvements in both regards:

While retaining his penchant for keeping the ball on the ground, he shaved his walk rate in half and brought his HardHit rate up to the 76th percentile. Indeed, his no-hitter was characterized by plenty of soft contact. Of the 18 batted balls Turnbull allowed, only two had an xBA over .500. Most of his outs were recorded on the ground, and even when the Mariners managed to lift the ball into the air, a lack of exit velocity translated into routine catches for the Tigers’ defense. The lone moment when Turnbull was in critical danger of losing his no-hit bid came in the bottom of the fourth. Mitch Haniger launched a ball (101.7 mph, 29 degrees, .710 xBA) that center fielder Akil Baddoo caught at the warning track:

It’s worth noting how Turnbull generated the soft contact that propelled his no-hitter. His arsenal consists of a four-seam fastball, slider, sinker, curveball, and a seldom-thrown changeup. Against the Mariners, he relied primarily on his four-seamer and slider, which made up 75% of his pitches. Despite the former’s middling vertical break and velocity, Turnbull locates it up in the zone to create contrast with the latter, which sports above-average arm-side break. Solid command of both worked in Turnbull’s favor, as evidenced by a combined CSW (called strike plus whiff) rate of 38%.

The sinker didn’t take center stage during the no-hit bid, but there’s been recent evidence to suggest the pitch bolsters his four-seam fastball. Since the introduction of spin direction to Baseball Savant, we’ve been able to see how the two pitches interact. They spin out of Turnbull’s hand on a near-identical axis, but the sinker diverges as it reaches home plate due to added movement from its seam-shifted wake. So while the metrics on either pitch doesn’t stand out, the resulting synergy is enough to work in Turnbull’s favor. Courtesy of Eno Sarris, here’s an overlay showing how the process might work in real time:

MY FIRST OVERLAY. Spencer Turnbull’s seam-shifted wake two-seam has nearly the same spin axis as his four-seam, but because of the orientation of the seams, goes in a different direction. More tomorrow: pic.twitter.com/nhvDP0z5QN

— Eno Sarris (@enosarris) January 21, 2021

In the beginning, as always, the signs of a no-hitter lay dormant. We didn’t know at the time, but Jeimer Candelario set its foundation with a solo blast in the first inning. Later in the third inning, he struck again with an RBI groundout to make it a 2-0 ballgame. After that, peace settled in. Each team’s respective starter added a few scoreless innings. The Mariners did earn their first baserunner via a Jarred Kelenic walk in the fourth and yet, nobody thought much of it. Only when the game entered the seventh or eighth inning did people begin to notice Turnbull’s efforts. By the time Baddoo and Jonathan Schoop tacked on two runs in the ninth, they were the least of everybody’s concerns. Soon, the final trial loomed. A leadoff walk spelled potential trouble, but Turnbull got the last out on a swinging strikeout of Haniger. And that was it:

This is the fifth no-hitter of the season. There’s bound to be fatigue, and on social media, the response to Turnbull’s night was mixed. Congratulations went around, but some focused on the imbalance between hitters and pitchers, the deadened baseball, the possibility of adjusting the pitching mound. And they’re right. At some point, the myriad flaws within the game should be addressed. But in isolation, a no-hitter is still one of the sport’s most magical events. It’s a tale of how one man beats the odds against a squad of nine. It’s also a tale of how his teammates dive and leap to preserve an elusive dream, sometimes elevating them to a sort of folk status, à la Dewayne Wise.

When someone you trained, travelled, and eaten with for years emerges triumphant, all caveats go out the window. You don’t care his performance was, at times, sloppy. You don’t mind if the opposing hitters were feeble. Only elation remains, because you understand the steps leading to this moment. And so when Turnbull turned, inhaled, and then roared at his catcher, the festivities began – context be damned.

That people are more concerned than awed by this latest no-hitter is understandable. If games like this become truly ubiquitous, they will lose their charm. But who knows – maybe this was the last no-hitter of the season. We didn’t foresee Spencer Turnbull of all starters delivering such a performance on a random night in May; I certainly didn’t foresee myself writing about it. As long as such an achievement retains its aura of wonder and unpredictability, it will remain a cause for celebration.