Wednesday, May 27, 2009

FIM #4: Bunning Goes Perfect


1964 was one of the most memorable seasons in Phillies history. It was full of highs and ended in disaster. One of those special moments came on June 21 versus the Mets at Shea Stadium. It was also Father's Day (ironically this year Father's Day falls on June 21 again) and Jim Bunning would throw the greatest game any pitcher in a Phillies uniform ever threw.

Johnny Stephenson steps up to the play with 2 outs in the bottom of the 9th. Bunning, who already dropped the first 26 batters, makes Stephenson his next victim as he strikes him out. That's what we like to call perfection.

Bunning went 9 complete innings, striking out 10 and giving up no runs, hits, or errors. 27 men stepped to the plate and 27 men couldn't reach first base. Bunning only threw 90 pitches, 79 of them were strikes. His perfect game was the first one the National League had seen in 84 years. Basically a perfect game in the NL was like a World Series to the Cubs (ouch!).

Bunning also helped his own cause offensively as he drove in two runs with a double that game and got offensive support from Johnny Callison's solo home run.

Here is the box score of that amazing day:

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