Wishing a happy 45th birthday to Wilson Alvarez, who threw a no-hitter for the 1991 Chicago White Sox in just his second major league start.

Alvarez, a 6-foot-1 lefty from Maracaibo, Venezuela, no-hit the Baltimore Orioles on August 11, 1991, walking five and striking out seven.

His outing at Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium went considerable better than his major league debut, in which he left the game after facing five batters without getting a single out. On July 24, 1989 as a member of the Texas Rangers, Alvarez yielded a leadoff single to Junior Felix and then served up back-to-back homers to Tony Fernandez and Kelly Gruber. Bobby Valentine pulled Alvarez after the southpaw followed the homers by issuing bases on balls to George Bell and Fred McGriff.

Alvarez went on to carve out a 14-year career, posting a 102-92 record with a 3.96 ERA. He retired in 2005 as a member of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Category: No-no birthdays2 Comments
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Author: Dirk Lammers

Dirk Lammers is a veteran journalist who began rooting for the New York Mets in the early-1970s when the team’s no no-hitter count was barely 2,000 games old. Lammers has since turned his research into Baseball’s No-Hit Wonders: More Than a Century of Pitching’s Greatest Feats (Unbridled Books) and NoNoHitters.com, where he maintains the Internet's largest archive of no-hitter information.

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