Hitting The Cutoff Man

Tuesday night's tilt between the Dodgers and D-Backs in Arizona offered a strange pitching line. D-Backs starter Dan Haren recorded each of his first nine outs via the 'K,' while also giving up three singles and ended his night after six innings having struck out 10 and allowed 10 hits.

The double-digit strikeouts and hits jump out a bit, since you would expect that a pitcher dominant enough to rack up that many Ks wouldn't be giving up that many hits.

But how unusual a feat is it? Well, counting Haren's performance Tuesday, it's happened 276 times since 1920 and 16 times since 2000. Adam Wainwright and John Lackey both did it last season, and while no active pitcher has done it more than once, among the recently retired, Randy Johnson had seven such games and Curt Schilling had four.

The Big Unit had one particular outing that stands out.

On June 24, 1997, he started for the Mariners against the A's at the Kingdome in Seattle. Johnson gave up four runs on 11 hits that day, including two homers (one of which was a shot by Mark McGwire that was one of the hardest-hit baseballs I've ever seen). But he also struck out 19, one short of the record for a nine-inning game, even though he took the loss as Oakland won 4-1.

That's the record for most strikeouts in a 10-hit game that went nine innings, but it's not the overall record. That distinction belongs to Tom Chaney, who threw all 16 innings of the Washington Senators' 2-1 victory over the Baltimore Orioles on Sept. 12, 1962. He gave up 10 hits and racked up 21 Ks.

Conversely, the record for most hits allowed in a game with at least 10 strikeouts is held by Burleigh Grimes (one of the all-time great baseball names), who struck out 10 but surrendered 18 hits in 12 innings as his Brooklyn Dodgers beat the Boston Braves 6-5 on Sept. 9, 1922. However, nobody since 1960 has allowed more than 13 hits in a 10-plus K game.

Now Haren has something to work for his next time out.

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