Athletics’ JT Ginn Loses No-Hitter and Game on Same Pitch in Brutal Walk-Off Loss to Angels
JT Ginn was 27 outs away from history. He did not get the last three. He did not even get one.
The Oakland Athletics right-hander took a no-hitter and a 1-0 lead into the ninth inning Monday night against the Los Angeles Angels. Adam Frazier broke up the no-hitter with a leadoff line drive over the shortstop. Two batters later, Zach Neto crushed a 2-0 sinker 413 feet to center field for a two-run walk-off home run. Final score: Angels 2, A’s 1.
Four pitches. That was the entire collapse. Ginn went from making history to losing the game in four pitches.
What he just did is barely possible. He became only the second pitcher in the last 40 seasons to throw a complete-game walk-off loss after allowing zero hits through eight innings. The other one was Rich Hill. That is the entire club. Ginn racked up a career-high 105 pitches and struck out 10 hitters.
The script could not have been worse if you wrote it for a movie. Lawrence Butler came off the bench in the eighth inning and drove in Zack Gelof with an RBI single to give Oakland that 1-0 lead. Ginn took the ball in the ninth with a chance to finish what he started. He got the first part right by getting to two strikes on Frazier. Then Frazier turned around an 0-2 pitch and lined a clean single to left.
That alone is a gut punch. Losing a no-hitter with one out from being in the eighth inning is brutal. But Ginn’s night somehow got worse. After a hit batter, Neto stepped in with the tying run already on. The first two pitches were balls. Then a 2-0 sinker stayed too far out over the plate, and Neto hit it dead center.
The A’s had been celebrating in the dugout before the inning started. The catcher had been calling pitches with the no-hitter in mind for the better part of two hours. Mark Kotsay had to navigate the toughest manager decision of the year: do you trust your guy who has been dealing all night, or do you go to the bullpen with a no-hitter on the line?
Kotsay trusted Ginn. You almost have to in that spot. Pulling a starter who has not allowed a hit in eight innings is the kind of move that gets you booed for the rest of your career if it does not work. But the cost of trusting him was a no-hitter and a loss in the span of four pitches.
For Ginn, this is the kind of game that defines a career either way. Some pitchers come back from a moment like this stronger. They use it as motivation. They become reliably great. Others get stuck in the mental loop of what could have been.
The A’s are a young team trying to prove they can hang in the American League. Ginn has been one of their better starters this season, and Monday’s outing was the best night of his life until the last four pitches. That is baseball at its cruelest. You can do everything right for 105 pitches and still lose because the 102nd one stayed too far over the plate.
Neto, for what it is worth, has been on a tear. That was his eighth home run of the year. The Angels needed it because their season has been mostly miserable. They will take the win however it comes.
Ginn will pitch again. He will hopefully find another nine-inning outing like this one. Just probably not the same ninth inning.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
