Whenever I cover a game Julio Teheran starts, I tell myself, “Be ready. This could be a no-hitter.” He came four outs from such a feat two years ago against Pittsburgh — I was on hand — and I fully expect him to negotiate those final four outs soon.
Wednesday’s game had the feel of that day versus the Pirates. Batters weren’t just missing but missing badly. He struck out the side in the first. He was unlucky in the second when Yasmani Grandal’s grounder was botched by Kelly Johnson, who can play many positions, but apparently not first base.
I thought it was an error. Mike Stamus, the official scorer (and a good one), deemed it a hit. But I spent the next few innings thinking that what happened to the Cubs’ Jon Lester here Saturday — a one-hitter reverted to being a no-hitter after a scoring change — could happen to Teheran. I stayed ready.
Through four innings, Teheran had been the Teheran of the past two seasons, not the halting version we’ve seen too often this year. (He was pulled from Friday’s start against the Cubs with two out in the fifth inning of a tie game.) He’d struck out seven and picked off one. He’d made Adrian Gonzalez, one of the game’s most polished hitters, look feeble. Then Teheran got unlucky again.
Grandal led off the fifth with a drive into right. Nick Markakis broke inward, then scurried back. The ball carried over his head for a double. There’s no way it could have been scored an error, but Jason Heyward — to drop a name — catches that one.
Carl Crawford grounded to first, pushing Grandal to third. Alberto Callaspo, briefly a Brave, slapped a single past a drawn-in Jace Peterson. The game was tied, but Teheran had a chance to escape the inning. Then Jimmy Rollins, who entered the game hitting .204, lined a double into the gap in right-center.
Now it was 2-1 Dodgers, and Teheran was looking at no no-hitter, no shutout and — given how Mike Bolsinger was dispensing with Braves — maybe no victory. Damage control was now a must. Teheran fanned Bolsinger. Two out, runner on second, Joc Pederson up.
Teheran had struck out Pederson — the rookie who leads the National League in whiffs — in the first and third, both times on four-seamers gauged at 94 mph. Here Teheran overthought. “I threw him a slider,” he said. “I didn’t thrown one to him the first two times. It was a pitch I wanted to throw.”
It was, alas, a pitch that lent speed to a bat incapable of touching those four-seamers. Pederson singled to right to make it 3-1. That’s how this would end.
“He pitched well enough to win the ballgame,” manager Fredi Gonzalez said. Then this: “It might have been his best outing of the year.”
One of the 24-year-old’s best starts of 2015 became another loss — his fifth, against six wins. Teheran matched a career best with 11 strikeouts. (He’d had 11 against Pittsburgh in June 2013.) “The whole game I felt good,” he said. “Everything was working — except for that one inning.”
And that’s the point. With the Braves’ hitters doing next to nothing, Teheran needed to pitch something close to a shutout to win. His stuff seemed sharp enough for that to happen, but in the course of six hitters, the game was gone.
If you’re the Braves, you’re tickled that this prized young pitcher, whose ERA had soared above 5.00 last month, worked his fourth quality start in the past six. Still, you wonder about that one bad inning.
There’s no longer an issue with Teheran’s fastball. He’s touching 94 on a consistent basis and again overmatching so many hitters that you’re surprised when anybody hits him hard. But he couldn’t quell the only real threat the Dodgers mustered, which is baseball’s way of telling that the best young pitcher this team has developed since Steve Avery isn’t fully formed.
“I know it’s been a difficult year,” Teheran said, “but that’s part of the game. I have to keep working hard.”
If he does, I believe there’ll come a time when everything falls into place, and that time won’t just last long enough for Teheran to get his no-hitter. It will last long enough for him to win a Cy Young or two. But he’s not there yet.
