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Watch Noah Syndergaard strike out eight consecutive hitters

There have been a handful of pitchers over the years who, when they had their best stuff, were nearly impossible to hit. To say pitchers like Clayton Kershaw, Pedro Martinez, Sandy Koufax and Steve Carlton were capable of pitching like they entered a cheat code into the system would oversell the power of cheat codes ... they were better than that, even.
Noah Syndergaard is perhaps the latest addition to that echelon of pitchers. During the Mets' 3-2 win over the Brewers on Sunday, Milwaukee hitters learned just how nasty Thor's stuff can be. Eight straight hitters -- from Orlando Arcia making the second out of the second inning to Domingo Santana making the final out of the fourth inning -- all failed to put the ball in play off Syndergaard.
The movement on the first pitch to Arcia, though a ball, foreshadowed the nastiness that was in store. No, that's not the wind blowing a beach ball. That's just what Syndergaard does:

After starting with the sinker in, he struck Arcia out on the fastball away:

Jett Bandy also had some difficulty with that fastball to end the second inning:

To start the third inning, Thor gave Jhoulys Chacín a taste of his sinker:

Then froze Jonathan Villar on a slider:

And went right back to it to get Eric Thames swinging for his fifth straight strikeout:

To start the fourth inning, Lorenzo Cain couldn't handle the changeup. And, who can blame him? Look at how far that pitch breaks:

Nor could Travis Shaw:

For the eighth and final strikeout of the sequence, Syndergaard finished as he started: A fastball low and away. Too bad for Santana, who did the same thing Arcia did:

Do you want to see all eight strikeouts in one place? Of course you do!

In all, Syndergaard recorded 11 strikeouts in 5 1/3 innings while allowing only two hits. After seeing the stuff he brought with him to the mound, those two hits the Brewers mustered off him should probably go down as a moral victory.

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