This story was excerpted from Ian Browne’s Red Sox Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
BOSTON – It was more than 24 years ago, and I was in my first year covering the Red Sox for MLB.com, and everyone in the press box, the stands and even the two dugouts at Fenway Park were feeling a little restless. That’s what happens when you sit through a two-hour and five-minute rain delay waiting for the game to start.
But Pedro Martínez had a way of making everything worth the wait.
So when Payton Tolle threw his immaculate first inning on Sunday – after a rain delay of nearly two hours – my mind immediately flashed back to May 18, 2002.
Feats like this, these rare milestone moments, are what set baseball apart.
I’ve seen two no-hitters, plus at least four cycles I remember off the top of my head, and countless other unforgettable moments.
The one thing I’ve still never seen live is a perfect game. Here’s hoping I’ll get to witness that someday.
Though I had a scheduled day off on Sunday and wasn’t in my press box perch to witness Tolle becoming the sixth Red Sox pitcher in history to throw an immaculate inning, I immediately flashed back to Martínez against the Mariners on that soggy Saturday nearly a quarter century ago.
Of the eight times on record that Red Sox pitchers have thrown immaculate innings (including three times by Chris Sale), Tolle and Martínez are the only two who started a game by doing so.
Martínez’s day started with the ultimate challenge – facing Ichiro Suzuki. The Seattle hit king was in just his second year stateside, but already a legend.
But he wasn’t ready for Martínez’s first two pitches – a pair of high fastballs which both went for called strikes. The third pitch was a changeup that Suzuki weakly waved through. Seldom had he looked so overmatched on a swing before or after that.
Mark McLemore was up next, and swung through a first-pitch curveball. Then he fouled off a fastball. And looked at a fastball on the outside corner to become Martínez’s second victim.
Ruben Sierra was all that stood between Martínez and what wound up being the only immaculate inning of his Hall of Fame career. Sierra watched a cutter go by for a strike, and looked at a fastball next to make it 0-2.
At this point, the Fenway Park crowd stood as one.
“The crowd is standing already, in the first inning,” Red Sox radio play-by-play man Joe Castiglione, a sound of surprise in his voice, informed his audience.
When Martínez got Sierra to fish for a high fastball, the roar was instantaneous.
“That gave us a huge lift,” Boston’s Brian Daubach said after the game. “Running in from left field after the inning, I was like, 'All right, now we’ve got a game.’”
The Red Sox went on to win, 4-1, as Martinez improved to 10-0 against the Mariners with a 0.94 ERA covering 77 innings. Keep in mind that the Mariners of the late 90s and early 2000s were one of the best teams in the game.
While Tolle didn’t face that stiff of an opponent in the Royals, he did go through one of the best players in the game in Bobby Witt Jr. to accomplish his feat. Kansas City’s No. 2 hitter, Witt waved through three straight fastballs between 97 and 98 mph as the second punchout of the first inning.
One of the indelible moments from Tolle’s immaculate frames: the huge grin that spread across his face almost unconsciously between pitches eight and nine. He knew what he was on the verge of doing and soaked in the moment.
Martínez? He never smiled on the mound. He couldn’t compete and have fun at the same time, like Tolle has the unique ability to do.
As different as their personalities are, they are now forever linked in Red Sox history.