Here are the 5 best games by Friars pitchers

SAN DIEGO -- Previously, we took a look at the greatest single-game hitting performances in Padres history. Without further ado, these are the five best games for a San Diego pitcher:

5. Jones' 89-minute masterpiece
May 4, 1977
Considering the way baseball is currently played, nearly half a century later, a game like this doesn't feel possible. Then again, Randy Jones did a lot of things on the mound that don't feel possible. Jones -- the ultimate "crafty lefty" -- was a pitcher from a different era. He worked absurdly quickly and regularly induced pitiful contact from opposing hitters. Jones won an ERA title in 1975 and a Cy Young Award in '76, despite tallying fewer than 200 strikeouts across more than 600 innings. But his masterpiece came in '77. Facing Philadelphia's Jim Kaat, a similarly quick worker, Jones pitched nine innings of one-run ball against an absolutely loaded Phillies lineup that would go on to win 101 games. Jones disposed of them in 89 minutes. Eighty-nine minutes. The Padres won the game, 4-1, but it wasn't all bad for Kaat, who famously had tickets to a Kenny Rankin concert that night. He later told the San Diego Union-Tribune: "The concert started at 9 o’clock. I was there, showered and dressed and in my seat. Didn’t miss a thing."

4. Cease no-hits Nats
July 25, 2024
Two years prior, Dylan Cease had carried a no-hitter into the ninth inning while pitching for the White Sox, when Luis Arraez, then playing for the Twins, broke it up with a two-out single. This time, Cease would finish the job. And when he emerged from a throng of celebrating Padres, there was Arraez, now his teammate, presenting him with the baseball. Cease was brilliant against the Nationals, a performance manager Mike Shildt called “magnificent.” He struck out nine and walked three -- and got some help from his defense, with Jackson Merrill and Xander Bogaerts combining to make a crazy catch in which Bogaerts juggled the ball in the air into Merrill’s glove.

3. Kirby's 15-inning marathon
Sept. 24, 1971
"In a losing effort" isn't something anyone wants attached to their on-field accolades. But few players have ever done more in a losing effort than Kirby. Facing the Astros in a meaningless late-September affair, Kirby worked a remarkable 15 innings, allowing a fourth-inning home run to Houston left fielder Rich Chiles but little else. He struck out 15 in a game that saw Hall of Fame second baseman Joe Morgan go 0-for-8. Kirby's game score of 109 is the highest for any pitcher in the divisional era -- and it still wasn't enough. The Padres went to their bullpen in the 16th and eventually lost in the 21st. And -- as if those 21 innings weren't enough -- it was merely Game 1 of a doubleheader. The Padres and Astros entered the ninth inning of Game 2 tied as well. But Johnny Jeter mercifully ended it with a walk-off single.

2. No-no Joe
April 9, 2021
It took 53 seasons, but the Padres’ first no-hitter was worth the wait. Joe Musgrove -- the hometown kid who had been traded to San Diego the previous offseason -- snapped the longest no-hitter drought for any team in MLB history. And he did so with an utterly dominant performance against the Rangers in Texas. Musgrove plunked Joey Gallo in the fourth inning, but was otherwise perfect, striking out 10 and walking none. After decades upon decades of near misses -- a history the Musgrove family was intimately familiar with -- Musgrove’s gem was a perfect conclusion to the Padres’ no no-nos saga.

1. Brown outduels Johnson in the postseason
Sept. 29, 1998
If and when the Padres throw their first no-hitter, that performance will most likely find itself tucked nicely into the No. 2 spot on this list. It'll be awfully hard to supplant Kevin Brown in the top spot. Brown's performance against the Astros in Game 1 of the 1998 NL Division Series remains one of the greatest postseason games ever pitched. He faced a Houston lineup led by future Hall of Famers Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio, plus an excellent supporting cast in a raucous Astrodome. Oh, and Brown was pitching opposite Randy Johnson, too. All Brown did was strike out 16 Astros across eight scoreless innings, while allowing just two hits. Those 16 K's are a Division Series record and the second most in a postseason game in history, trailing Bob Gibson's 17-K shutout in the '68 World Series. In the pantheon of Padres pitching seasons, Brown's '98 campaign stands alone at the top. This was Brown at his '98 best.