FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                            Contact: Chuck Paiva-  gm@newportgulls.com

February 11, 2020                                                                                 President & General Manager

TOP 20 MOMENT COUNTDOWN: #15

Gulls Continue to Countdown Top 20 Moments in History

NEWPORT, RI-  Unlike any other sport, in baseball, defense controls the game and you fail far more times than you will succeed. Grand Slams, Perfect Games, Triple Plays, and No-Hitters are successes that occur even fewer and farther in-between. Major League Baseball states that the No-Hitter is "a game in which a pitcher, or pitchers, gives up no hits while pitching at least nine innings. A pitcher may give up a run or runs so long as he pitches nine innings or more and does not give up a hit." Since the MLB’s inception in 1875, there have only been 302 no-hitters, 14 of which were combined no-hitters; the utilization of multiple pitchers in one game where no hits were allowed. Following suit with the rarity of a No-Hitter, there have been only been 12 throughout the history of the New England Collegiate Baseball League. Three of the 12 total hitless games were combined no-hitters and two of these combined no-hitters came at the hand of Newport Gull's pitchers.

                                                                                                              Moment #15

Gulls Pitchers Combine for No-Hitters in 2005 and 2006

On July 1, 2005, Newport sent RHP  Jeremy Hall  (East Tennessee State) to the mound against the Danbury Westerners. Hall walked the first batter who then advanced to second on an error, but no one could guess what would happen next- 27 outs in a row. 

Hall retired six batters via four strikeouts and two groundouts before he was relieved by RHP  Danny Otero (Duke University) who pitched the next five innings. Otero, a member of the Newport Gulls Hall of Fame and active Cleveland Indian pitcher, struck out five during his portion of the hitless contest. Otero gave way to LHP Josh Lairsey (Georgia Southern University) who got two Westerners to pop out and other to ground out at the bottom of the 8th Inning. LHP  Travis Webb  (Washington State University)  was tasked with capping off the historic night. After the first batter grounded out, Webb recorded out 26 and 27 via strikeout giving the Gulls the 5-0 win over Danbury and their first no-hitter in team history, fourth among NECBL franchises.

Full Box Score & Play by Play: http://www.necbl.com/necbl_historical/2005webstats/701ngdw.htm

Newport's second no-hitter game just over one year after the first- July 21, 2006. RHP  Brandon McKerney of Washington University was given the start against the North Adams Steeplecats at Cardines Field. Eerily similar to 2005's no-hitter, McKerney walked his first batter but settled in immediately after, completing 5.2 innings on the day. Newport Gulls Class of 2019 Hall of Fame Pitcher Paul “The Bulldog” Nardozzi  (Pittsburgh) capped off the sixth inning for McKerney after walking the first batter he faced, similar to McKerney in the first. Entering the final frame, it was all but certain the Gulls would complete the triumphant feat as Gull's closer Mike Lynn (College of Charleston) was nearly unhittable that summer. Lynn attended the College of Charleston and recorded nine saves during the regular season, finishing the year with a 1.04 ERA and leading the Gulls in appearances with 19. He induced two fly outs before the final batter grounded out to second base for the 5-0 victory over North Adams and sealing the second combined no-hitter in Newport Gulls history.

Full Box Score & Play by Play: http://www.necbl.com/necbl_historical/2006webstats/721nang.htm

The Newport Gulls have not recorded another no-hitter since the 2006 performance, making these games that much more special and a huge part of Gulls History. Each member of both games did their part to create history and will forever be remembered.

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The Newport Gulls, members of the 13-team New England Collegiate Baseball League (NECBL), are a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, founded as the Rhode Island Gulls in 1998 in Cranston, R.I., before moving to Newport in 2001. In addition to recruiting, fielding, and developing a team of the nation’s top collegiate baseball athletes and attracting 50,000 fans annually to Cardines Field, the predominantly volunteer organization strives to benefit the community of Newport County via summer camps, reading programs, fundraisers, scholarships, and charitable donations – totaling over $1 million since 2001. The Gulls are six-time champions of the NECBL – the winningest franchise in league history – and were ranked as the overall No. 1 summer collegiate baseball team in the country by Perfect Game USA in 2012.

For more information about the Newport Gulls, visit  facebook.com/newportgulls , follow the Gulls on Twitter @NewportGulls or visit  www.newportgulls.com .

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