Have you ever heard of an immaculate inning? It’s a relatively rare achievement for a pitcher, in which he strikes out all three batters he faces in an inning, using the minimum number of pitches. In other words, get up, throw nine straight strikes, and sit down.
Historically, there haven’t been many immaculate innings:
1880s-1940s: 8
1950s: 3
1960s: 8
1970s: 8
1980s: 4
1990s: 17
2000s: 14
2010s: 37 (hello, strikeout era)
2020s: 9
But if you can believe it, two of those nine immaculate innings happened today (June 15), when Astros pitchers Luis Garcia and Phil Maton threw two in the same game … against the SAME THREE BATTERS.
I know we’ve seen more of these lately, but this is still incredible!