Today in Blue Jays History: Roy Halladay’s 10 Inning Shutout

19 Years Ago Today

Roy Halladay threw a 10-inning, complete-game shutout.

The Blue Jays were hosting the Tigers. The Tigers were not a good team (I know that will surprise you). Going into the game, they were 37-103, on their way to a 119-loss season. On the plus side, the Tigers made it to the World Series 3 years later (losing out to the Cardinals).

Halladay was amazing. He lost his perfect game in the third inning on an Eric Hinske error. Following his Rookie of the Year, Hinske didn’t have the season we hoped. Going into the game, he was hitting .239/.324/.439, which was his 16th error (he would finish with 22 errors). In his Rookie of the Year season, he had a 2.5 UZR/150. In 2003 he had a -13.1 UZR/150. I don’t know what happened, but he forgot how to play the position. After 2004, they moved him to first base.

After the error, Doc hit the next batter. Maybe a loss in concentration after the error? Doc was intense. But he got out of the inning.

Doc walked Carlos Pena with two out in the fourth and then got the next 12 batters in a row.

In the eighth, with two out, the Tigers got their first hit of the game, a Kevin Witt pinch-hit double. Witt was a first-round Blue Jays draft pick in 1994. He got into 20 games with the Jays, split over the 1998 and 1999 seasons, and the Jays released him after the 2000 season.

Next, he went to the Padres, Reds, then Tigers. After the Tigers, he went to the Cardinals and Rays. First-round picks get many, many chances.

2003 was his best season in the majors, hitting .263/.301/.407 with 10 home runs in 93 games (he played 146 games career).

Halladay gave up back-to-back singles to Warren Morris and Bobby Higginson to start the 9th inning, but a double play and a fly-out ended the inning.

Morris was a second baseman who hit .272/.316/.373 that season, his last in the majors. Higginson was in the wind-down phase of a pretty decent career. In 2000 he hit .300/.377/.538 with 30 home runs, but by 2003 the power part of his game had disappeared. Higginson hit .235/.320/.369 with 14 home runs in 130 games. Career, he hit .272/.358/.455 with 187 home runs in 1362 games over 11 seasons.

Roy would have a 1-2-3 tenth inning and finished 10 innings with a 3-hitter, 1 walk, and 5 strikeouts. He threw just 99 pitches (99 pitches to go 10 innings!) And he had his season’s best GameScore at 90.

Our Jays didn’t have much more luck against Nate Cornejo. He went 9 innings, allowed 5 hits, 2 walks with 2 strikeouts.

Cornejo wasn’t a future Hall of Famer. He had a 4.65 ERA (he came out of it with a 4.40 ERA). He would go 6-17 that season. He had his best start of his career (77 Game Score) this game. Career, he had a 12-29 record and a 5.41 ERA in 56 starts.

We had more luck in the tenth when the Tigers brought in Fernando Rodney. The 10th inning went as follows:

• Hinske walked.
• Pinch-hitter Howie Clark bunted Hinske to second.
• Orlando Hudson struck out.
• Greg Myers was intentionally walked. Myers had a great year with the bat, hitting .307/.374/.502 in 121 games. He would only play 14 more MLB games after that season.
• Pinch-hitter Bobby Kielty hit the walk-off single.

We ended up with 6 hits. Delgado had 3 of them (and an intentional walk). When he singled in the ninth manager, Carlos Tosca pinch ran Dave Berg in his spot (Josh Phelps hit into a double play to end the inning).

Our starting lineup:

Reed Johnson RF

Frank Catalanotto LF

Vernon Wells CF

Carlos Delgado 1B

Josh Phelps DH

Eric Hinske 3B

Mike Bordick SS

Orlando Hudson 2B

Kevin Cash C

We had some pretty good players back then. That top four features four of my favourite Blue Jays of all time.

Bordick was 37 and had a decent season for a 37-year-old middle infielder. He played 102 games, hit .274/.340/.382 with 5 home runs, and retired after the season.

Phelps (like Carlos Delgado) was our catcher of the future at one time, but his defense didn’t keep up with his bat. In 2002, he hit .309/.362/.562 with 15 home runs in 74 games. Phelps finished 6th in Rookie of the Year voting. In 2003, he hit .268/.358/.470 with a career-high 20 home runs. Unfortunately, that was pretty much the peak of his career. He played eight seasons and hit .273/.343/.472 with 64 home runs.

Hudson played his first 4 MLB seasons with the Jays. After the 2005 season, the Jays traded Hudson to the Diamondbacks (along with Miguel Batista) for Troy Glaus and Sergio Santos. The team had Aaron Hill coming up and wanted to make room for him. Orlando had an excellent 11-year career, hitting .273/.341/.412 with 93 home runs in 1345 games. He also won 4 Gold Gloves.

We finished 86-76, but that was only good enough for third place, 16 games back of the Yankees (and 9 games back of the Red Sox).

Halladay would finish the season 22-7 (the most wins in his career) with a 3.25 ERA in 36 starts. He had 9 complete games (leading the league) and 2 shutouts, and a league-leading 266 innings. That was good for an 8.1 bWAR and the Cy Young Award. It was his best season with the Blue Jays.

I can only find two extra-inning complete-game shutouts since then. Mark Mulder for the Cardinals on April 23rd, 2005, against the Astros. He went 10 innings on 5 hits, no walks and 5 strikeouts.

Complete games are almost totally a thing of the past. Extra inning complete games? We may never see one again. There have only been 3 in the last 20 years, and Halladay had two of them.