In baseball, a perfect game is a game in which one or more pitchers complete a minimum of nine innings with no batter from the opposing team reaching any base. To achieve a perfect game, a team must not allow any opposing player to reach base by any means: no hits, walks, hit batsmen, uncaught third strikes, catcher's or fielder's interference, or fielding errors which allow a batter to reach base.
A perfect game, by definition, is also a no-hitter, and is also guaranteed to result in a win and a shutout if the game does not go into extra innings. In leagues that use a WBSC tiebreaker (including MLB since 2020), runners are placed on second base, and in some leagues, also on first base at the start of each half inning during extra innings; this automatic runner would not cause a perfect game to be lost. Therefore, if the runner advances and scores without any batters reaching base (by means of stolen base, sacrifice, fielder's choice, etc.), and this turns out to be the winning run, then the losing team will still be credited with a perfect game, despite losing the game. A fielding error that does not allow a batter to reach base, such as a misplayed foul ball, does not spoil a perfect game. Games that last fewer than nine innings, regardless of cause, in which a team has no baserunners do not qualify as perfect games. Games in which a team reaches first base only in extra innings also do not qualify as perfect games.
The first known use of the term perfect game was in ; its current definition was formalized in . In Major League Baseball (MLB), it has been achieved 24 times – 22 times since the modern era began in 1901, most recently by Domingo Germán of the New York Yankees on June 28, 2023, against the Oakland Athletics. Although it is possible for two or more pitchers to combine for a perfect game (which has happened 20 times in MLB no-hitters), every MLB perfect game so far has been thrown by a single pitcher. Nippon Professional Baseball's 2007 Japan Series ended with a combined perfect game.
History
The first known occurrence of the term perfect game in print was in 1908. I. E. Sanborn's report for the Chicago Tribune about Addie Joss's performance against the White Sox calls it "an absolutely perfect game, without run, without hit, and without letting an opponent reach first base by hook or crook, on hit, walk, or error, in nine innings". Several sources have claimed that the first recorded usage of perfect game was by Ernest J. Lanigan in his Baseball Cyclopedia, made in reference to Charlie Robertson's 1922 perfect game. The Chicago Tribune came close to the term in describing Lee Richmond's game for Worcester in 1880: "Richmond was most effectively supported, every position on the home nine being played to perfection." Similarly, in writing up John Montgomery Ward's 1880 perfect game, the New York Clipper described the "perfect play" of Providence's defense.
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) existed from 1943 to 1954. Four of its players pitched a perfect game: Annabelle Lee in 1944, Carolyn Morris in 1945, Doris Sams in 1947, and Jean Faut in 1951 (against the Rockford Peaches) and again in 1953 (against the Kalamazoo Lassies). Faut is the only professional baseball player, male or female, to have pitched two perfect games.
There has been one perfect game in the World Series, thrown by Don Larsen for the New York Yankees against the Brooklyn Dodgers on October 8, 1956. By coincidence, Larsen was in attendance when Yankee pitcher David Cone threw a perfect game in 1999 on the same day that Larsen and Yogi Berra (the catcher in the 1956 perfect game) were invited to do the ceremonial first pitch.
Ron Hassey is the only catcher in MLB history to have caught more than one perfect game. His first was with pitcher Len Barker (for the Cleveland Indians against the Toronto Blue Jays) in 1981 and his second was with pitcher Dennis Martínez (forthe Montreal Expos against the Los Angeles Dodgers) in 1991.
The most recent perfect game for MLB occurred on June 28, 2023, with Domingo Germán of the New York Yankees against the Oakland Athletics in a 11–0 victory, finishing with 9 strikeouts. Germán became the first-ever pitcher born in the Dominican Republic to throw a perfect game in the MLB, as well as the third-ever non-American-born player to do so.