Yoshinobu Yamamoto became the 86^th pitcher to throw a no-hit shutout in Japanese pro baseball on Saturday, giving us a record four no-hitters in a season before July and the most since four were thrown in 1943, one shy of the record in 1940 in the deadest of Japan’s dead-ball eras.

Of course, we also had Yudai Ono taking a perfect game into the 10^th and Roki Sasaki throwing eight perfect innings in May, so it’s been some season, huh?

Shall we get started?

 

Saturday’s games

Buffaloes 2, Lions 0: At Seibu Dome, Yoshinobu Yamamoto (7-3) threw 102 pitches, walked one and struck out nine for his first career no-hitter. He threw 20 first-pitch strikes to the 28 batters he faced and only two batters got to three balls against him.