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The Grand Slam: McCarthy's immaculate inning highlights Yankees win
An inning without a baserunner allowed is considered perfect, but there's actually a greater, far more rare single-inning achievement for a pitcher to shoot for. It's called the "immaculate Inning," and it stands for complete and utter dominance.
To be credited with an immaculate inning, a pitcher must strike out all three batters in an inning on the minimum nine pitches. It's something that had only been done 71 times by 66 different pitchers coming into this season, but New York Yankees right-hander Brandon McCarthy became the sixth different pitcher to throw one this season. That's a new single-season major-league record.
McCarthy joined the elite list by striking out Wil Myers, Nick Franklin and Matt Joyce in the seventh inning of New York's 3-2 win.
"I actually didn't realize what it was until I got inside and I saw what it was on the broadcast," McCarthy said. "I was just happy it was three strikeouts, but I didn't realize what kind of an inning it was."
"It's something else you can add to your resume when you're done, and a story you can tell someone that they won't care about later on," McCarthy joked. "But at least in the meantime it's something cool."
McCarthy is the fifth Yankee ever to throw an immaculate inning, joining Al Downing, Ron Guidry, A.J. Burnett, and Ivan Nova. The others to throw one this season were Brad Boxberger, Cole Hamels, Justin Masterson, Garrett Richards and Rex Brothers.
ROYALS GAIN GROUND IN CENTRAL: The Orioles and Angels have already wrapped up their respective divisions, but the AL Central is far from settled. On Wednesday night, the Kansas City Royals moved to within one-half game of the Detroit Tigers by defeating the Chicago White Sox and Chris Sale 6-2.
Lorenzo Cain delivered the game's biggest hit with a three-run homer in the third inning. Alcides Escobar also homered off Sale to provide some insurance. But the story of the game and the series was Nori Aoki. The 32-year-old outfielder went 3 for 4, giving him a franchise-record 11 hits over a three-game series.
The Tigers, meanwhile, fell 8-4 in Minnesota. Left-hander David Price allowed five runs over 5 2/3 innings.
ROCKIES SCORE EIGHT IN FIRST, SMASH DODGERS:
As far as the San Francisco Giants are concerned, the Colorado Rockies offense is heating up at just the right time. After snapping a seven-game losing streak with a 10-4 blowout win against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night, Colorado came out swinging again on Wednesday afternoon, plating eight first-inning runs against Los Angeles rookie Carlos Frias en route to a victory 16-2.
The game was essentially over before it started as Colorado's offense racked up 11 hits in the first. That's two more than they had in the entire game on Tuesday, which was also obviously a big night. Amazingly, though, it's not a franchise record. On July 30, 2010, Colorado had 13 hits in the eighth inning against Chicago Cubs pitching, including an MLB record 11 straight.
Justin Morneau knocked in five runs in the huge inning with a three-run homer and a two-run single. He finished a triple shy of the cycle. Leadoff man Charlie Blackmon collected his third 5-for-5 game of the season.
GIANTS TAKE FULL ADVANTAGE: The Rockies provided a gift, and the Giants took advantage, defeating Arizona 4-2 to move to two games back in the NL West. Pinch-hitter Matt Duffy played the role of hero, delivering a go-ahead two-run single with the bases loaded and one out in the ninth. Closer Santiago Casilla made it hold up, pitching a clean inning for his 17th save.
Both teams have a scheduled day off on Thursday. Los Angeles opens a three-game series at Wrigley Field on Friday afternoon while San Francisco travels to San Diego for three. That leads into what should be a huge three-game series between the two beginning Monday night at Dodger Stadium.
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is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at bigleaguestew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813
