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Originally Published: April 22, 2005

Buehrle, Franklin display great haste

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By Jayson Stark
ESPN.com
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Useless 99-minute Information
Our favorite game of the year took place last weekend: White Sox 2, Mariners 1 in a very un-AL-like 1 hour, 39 minutes. That's about two innings of a Yankees-Red Sox game.

	Franklin

	Buehrle

A few tidbits on that classic, in which Mark Buehrle and Ryan Franklin threw every pitch (almost all of which seemed to be strikes):

• It was the fastest nine-inning game since Sept. 30, 1984 (also 1:39) -- Pascual Perez (Braves) vs. Greg Booker (Padres).

• There hasn't been a game played in less than 1:39 since Sept. 28, 1982 (1:33) -- Jim Clancy (Blue Jays) vs. Frank Viola (Twins).

• There was one walk in the game -- issued by Buehrle. And Franklin ran only two three-ball counts all day.

• All three hits allowed by Buehrle came from that relentless Ichiro Suzuki. And according to the Elias Sports Bureau, he's only the third hitter in the last 16 seasons to get all the hits in some pitcher's complete-game three-hitter. The others: Shawn Green off Kevin Appier (May 12, 1999) and Todd Walker off Rolando Arrojo (April 30, 1998).

• And the Mariners' trusty public-relations crew figured out that if you subtracted commercial breaks, Buehrle and Franklin got 51 outs in 65 minutes and 35 seconds.

Even More Useless Information
• An incredible thing happened this April: Neither league's incumbent Cy Young award winner started on Opening Day -- Roger Clemens in the NL, Johan Santana in the AL. (Roy Oswalt and Brad Radke assumed those honors.)

So when was the last time that happened?

Technically, it was 1982, when the Dodgers started Jerry Reuss over Fernando Valenzuela and the defending AL Cy Young was a reliever (Rollie Fingers). But the only other time it happened when both Cy Young incumbents were starters was 1968 -- when the Giants started Juan Marichal instead of Mike McCormick and the Red Sox had to start Dick Ellsworth because Jim Lonborg had blown out his knee skiing.

• In the second, third and fourth starts of his Yankees career, Randy Johnson allowed five runs in each. He made 192 starts as a Diamondback -- and never did that three starts in a row. In fact, he hadn't done it since April 25-May 6, 1992 -- which was nearly 400 starts ago.

• Carlos Zambrano pulled off a heck of a feat Opening Day. Those Cubbies scored 16 runs for him and handed him a seven-run lead in the second inning -- and he still didn't get the win. (He got yanked, then ejected, after 4 2/3 IP.)

He's the first starter to avoid winning an opener in which his team scored 16 runs or more, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, since 1983 -- when Fernando Valenzuela blew an early five-run lead in Houston and got knocked out in the third inning of a 16-7 win.

	Zambrano

	Zambrano

• Speaking of Zambrano, he was part of the greatest daily double in Zambrano history this week. On Wednesday, he hit the first triple of his career -- one day after his extremely unrelated namesake, Victor Zambrano, finished huffing and puffing out the first triple of his career, for the Mets.

We thought we were the only goofballs to notice that -- until loyal readers Eric Orns and John Buro checked in to verify that they caught it, too.

Buro's contribution: They were both stand-up triples.

Orn's note of the week: There were only five triples by pitchers all last year.

Our best bolt (after way too much research): It's the first time two pitchers with the same last name tripled in the same season since Lloyd and Jumbo Brown did it in 1928.

• There haven't been many stranger starts to any season than the way the Mets got rolling this year: Lost their first five games. Won their next six.

Elias reports that only one other team in history ever started any season by losing at least five in a row, then winning at least five in a row. That was Harold Reynolds' 1991 Mariners, who started 0-6, then won eight straight.

• We know the Red Sox haven't trailed in the first inning of any game all year -- because (through Thursday) they hadn't allowed a run in the first inning of any game all year. Just four other teams since 1980 have made it 16 games into a season without getting scored on in the first, according to Elias:

1990 Brewers (19)
1982 White Sox (18)
1986 Brewers (16)
1985 Cubs (16)

• This Marlins staff is pitching in the wrong era. Elias reports that the last NL team before these Marlins to throw five complete games in its first 12 games was the 1981 Dodgers. And even they barely compare -- since Fernando Valenzuela threw four of the five.

• Speaking of Marlins starters, Dontrelle Willis and Josh Beckett started this season by cranking out more bagels than Einstein. Willis pitched back-to-back complete-game shutouts. Beckett threw six shutout innings against Atlanta, then nine against Washington.

Retrosheet.org's Dave Smith reports that made the Marlins the 18th team in the last 45 seasons to have two different pitchers start a season with consecutive starts of at least six shutout innings.

Last time it happened was 2003, when both the Mariners (Jamie Moyer, Gil Meche) and Expos (Tony Armas Jr., Tomo Ohka) did it. But some of the other duos featured a lot more magical names. Such as ...

2002 Red Sox (Pedro Martinez, Derek Lowe)
1997 Braves (Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine)
1985 Dodgers (Fernando Valenzuela, Orel Hershiser)
1969 Orioles (Jim Palmer, Tom Phoebus)
1963 Dodgers (Sandy Koufax, Bob Miller)

• Two-plus weeks into the season, we've already seen five games which were scoreless after nine innings. According to Elias, that's the most 0-0 games ever played before May in any season in history.

And the kings of the 0-0 game are the Braves, who played two of them in a row Sunday and Monday (vs. the Phillies and Astros). Elias reports that we've had only two other instance of teams doing that back-to-back since 1969:

May 28-29, 2001 -- Giants vs. Diamondbacks (nine 0-0 innings, followed by 17 scoreless innings)

May 26-27, 1975 -- Phillies vs. Giants (10 shutout innings, followed by nine)

• Toronto's Reed Johnson has driven in four runs this year. But "driven" doesn't seem like the right word to describe half of them. On April 16, as part of a memorable 3-HBP game, he got nailed by pitches twice with the bases loaded.

Only three other players have pulled off that painful achievement in the last 45 years, according to Retrosheet -- Jose Vidro (June 22, 2001), Terry Kennedy (April 28, 1982) and Steve Boros (April 20, 1961).

• Feats by catchers don't get much cooler than an unassisted double play. And Reds catcher Jason LaRue got to turn one of those April 15, catching a pop-up and then tagging out the lost runner on third, Houston's Raul Chavez.

Retrosheet's Dave Smith found just 32 other 2-unassisted double plays since 1960 that didn't involve catcher's interference, and only 12 that didn't involve a runner getting thrown out stealing home on a strikeout. Last to do it before LaRue: Greg Zaun, on July 14, 2002 -- on a bizarre strikeout-tagout of a runner who tried to steal second but found the base already occupied.

• After Dmitri Young hit three home runs Opening Day, it took him two weeks -- and 12 games -- to hit another one. But that's no record.

Of the three men who have hit that opening-day trifecta (Young, Tuffy Rhodes and George Bell), Young would have needed to go trotless for another week to beat the Tuff Man -- who failed to homer for almost three weeks (April 4-April 24) after his three-homer stunner on Opening Day, 1994. Rhodes hit five more homers the rest of his career after that, by the way.

Really Useless Information
• Johan Santana became the first Cy Young award-winner in history to give up four runs in his first inning of the following season. The previous record, according to Elias, was three -- by Mike Flanagan in 1980.

• The Rockies roared off to an unprecedented start, even for them. They gave up 10 runs or more in Games 1, 2 and 3 of the season. Last team to do that, according to Elias: The 1978 Orioles.

• The Mets needed to score five runs in the eighth inning in each of their first two wins of the year. Last NL team to win two straight games by scoring at least five times in the eighth, according to Elias: Specs Toporcer's 1922 Cardinals.

• Elias reports that Pat Burrell was the first player in the 37-season division-play era to drive in 17 runs in the first 10 days of any season.

• The Mets hit one home run in their entire six-game homestand last week -- then hit seven in just the first six innings Tuesday in Philadelphia.

• In the Yankees' first 12 games of the year, they scored a total of one run in the second inning. As the Newark Star Ledger's Ed Price reports, they then scored 13 in the second inning of Game No. 13.

• Price also reports that the only four starting pitchers to lose to the Yankees this year all have a double-L in their name: David Wells, Curt Schilling, Rob Bell and Ted Lilly. Does that mean all those losses should count twice?

• Heading into this year, Brian Roberts had 90 doubles and 12 homers. Sixteen games into this season, he had six homers and one double.

• As Kansas City Star columnist Joe Posnanski reports, Royals DHs were batting a terrifying .183 through Thursday, and their cleanup hitters were hitting an embarrassing .141. We're thinking it probably won't make them feel better to know that the Cubs' pitchers were batting .300.

• Yankees starting pitchers went 11 straight games without a quality start (6+ IP, 3 ER or fewer). According to Elias, that's their longest stretch without one in the division-play era.

Boxscore Lines of the Month
FIRST PRIZE -- Tampa Bay's Rob Bell, Monday vs. the Yankees:

1 1/3 IP, 9 H, 10 R, 10 ER, 1 BB, 0 K, 1 HR, faced 14 hitters and 10 scored

FACT OF THE DAY: Bell was the first American Leaguer to give up 10 runs or more and get that few outs since Tom Gordon did it for the Royals (1 IP, 10 R) on Oct. 1, 1995.

SECOND PRIZE -- Oakland's Barry Zito, April 9 vs. Tampa Bay:

3 1/3 IP, 7 H, 11 R, 8 ER, 3 BB, 0 K, 2 HR

FACT OF THE DAY: Must be a Devil Rays thing. Zito also threw a 15-hitter against them in 1983.

HE'S NO. 1 DIVISION -- Tom Gordon, April 16 vs. Baltimore:

1.1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, 1 HR

NO-SWINGING-NECESSARY DIVISION -- Dodgers 3B Jose Valentin, April 6 vs. the Giants:

0 AB, 1 R, 0 H, 2 RBI

So that's a run and two runs driven in -- but no at-bats (thanks to four walks, two of them with the bases full). Thanks to loyal reader Perry Miyashita for pointing that one out.

Trivia answer
Question: In all four years of his American career, Ichiro Suzuki has had a batting average higher than .310. But three other active players also have done that all four years (all of whom would have qualified for the batting title in all four seasons). Can you name them?

Answer: Barry Bonds, Albert Pujols and Todd Helton.

Jayson Stark is a senior writer for ESPN.com.