Player #54I: Walter P. "Barney" Johnson. "The Big Train". Pitcher for the Washington Senators in 1907-1927. 417 wins and 34 saves in 21 MLB seasons. 1924 World Series champion. 1913 and 1924 AL Most Valuable Player. 3-time triple crown. 6-time AL wins leader. 5-time AL ERA leader. 12-time AL strikeout leader. He had a career ERA of 2.17 in 5,914.1 innings pitched. He pitched a no-hitter in 1920. He holds the MLB record with 110 career shutouts. MLB All-Time Team. Inducted to the MLB Hall of Fame in 1936. One of his best seasons was 1913 as he posted a record of 36-7 with a 1.14 ERA in 346 innings pitched.
Deveaux covers Johnson's 1920 season: In apparent defiance of all logic, it was during this troubled season (Johnson's career worst) that Walter Johnson threw the only no-hitter of his entire career. It was July 1, at Fenway Park in Boston, on his son Walter, Jr.'s fifth birthday. Johnson Sr., had in fact been detained that day because the young lad was feeling ill. The 13-year vet struck out ten and only five balls were hit beyond the infield. There were no walks, but it was not a perfect game. In the seventh, Bucky Harris missed what was by all accounts a soft grounder off the bat of future Hall of Famer Harry Hooper, who led off the inning for the Red Sox. Had that not happened, Johnson would have pitched the third perfect game in modern baseball history (since 1901) up to that time. The others had been authored by Cy Young, in 1904, and Addie Joss, in 1908.
The Big Train's best game of the year until then had been his previous start, a three-hit, no walk masterpiece in a 7-0 pasting of their Athletics, who thereby lost their 18th straight game. Johnson required only 72 pitches, and it was all over in just one hour and 18 minutes -- the most efficient game of his career. The win was the seventh in a row for the Nats and moved them past the Red Sox and into fourth place. But following the no hitter in his next start, there were no more heroics in store for Walter, who was plagued by a sore arm for the rest of the year.
In a way, Bucky Harris was heroic in Johnson's no-hit game as well, as it was he who drove in the game's only run, and Joe Judge saved the day in the ninth when, after Johnson had struck out two pinch hitters, the dangerous Hooper pulled a liner that Judge leaped for and caught cleanly off the ground. In no position to get to get to first in time to outrace Hooper, Judge had to relay to Johnson. The Big Train came in all right, and caught Judge's relay to nip Hooper. For extra theatrics, Johnson caught the ball with his bare hand. (The Washington Senators by Tom Deveaux.) (Note: Deveaux's use of "Hooper pulled a liner that Judge leaped for and caught cleanly off the ground" seems odd to me. Presumably, he describes a ball that bounced at least once before it got to Judge.)
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