It’s now been eight years since the term “No-han” became synonymous with one of the best moments in New York Mets history.
Baseball is a metaphor for life, and Johan Santana’s June 1 start against the St. Louis Cardinals is no different. This specific night included a lot of parallels from six years prior, and the best kind of distraction I didn’t know I needed until it happened.
At this point, the Mets had gone through their fair share of heartbreak in recent years. Losing Game 162 to the Florida Marlins and missing out on the playoffs in 2007 and 2008 were freaking terrible. However, for me it doesn’t hold a candle to 2006 because New York was so close to reaching the World Series.
The players and moments ingrained in my mind from that NLCS Game 7? The same guys virtually everyone else had in mind: Yadier Molina’s go-ahead home run, Carlos Beltran striking out with the bat on his shoulder, and Adam Wainwright’s game-ending curveball.
What was poetic is each player had a role in the No-han game, and unlike 2006, each instance went in favor of the Mets. Wainwright starting the game and ultimately getting the loss, Beltran’s foul ball in the sixth that should’ve been fair, and Mike Baxter’s incredible catch in the seventh, preventing an extra-base hit from Molina.
With each pitch, half inning, and moment, I moved closer to the edge of my seat like everyone else. The Mets were giving me a reason to smile at the second I needed it most.
In 2012, I was three years out of college and living on my own. It was my first year writing exclusively about the Mets for Rising Apple, and while I followed what New York did closely, I didn’t always sit down and watch every inning of every game. The night of the No-han landed on a Friday, and in a typical circumstance, I’d watch some or most of the game before going out and trying to catch pieces here and there while doing whatever I was doing.
Not on this night, though — I was at my childhood home in upstate New York and settled in on the couch for the game, opposite my mother. It was a position I staked many times growing up, but it happened on this night because my grandfather had died earlier that week.
It wasn’t a shock — he was 89 years old and battling different health issues for years — but it obviously still stung. We were heading to New Jersey the following day for his services, so I cut the drive from Connecticut in half by heading “home” first, and also because I just needed to be around my immediate family.
This game was a chance to forget about it all for a few hours, especially with Santana on the mound — a hurler my mother and I both shared an affinity for. As he rolled through the first third of the game, neither of us thought anything of the zero in St. Louis’ hit column.
I mean, let’s be honest — we had seen this movie way too many times before. But then he got through the fifth and we just looked at each other.
“You see what’s going on?” I asked her.
“Yup,” she replied.
Then came Beltran’s foul ball. Then Baxter’s catch. Then Terry Collins’ quick trip to the mound in the eighth. By the time the ninth inning rolled around, we could barely sit down, and definitely couldn’t once David Freese‘s strikeout made it official.
After pumping our fists, we just looked at each other in disbelief. It felt I was in an alternate reality at the moment. We just sat there watching the postgame interviews, mostly in silence because neither of us could wrap our heads around what we just saw happen.
Once I finally collected myself and my goosebumps enough to go upstairs, I had to sit down and write a freakin’ game recap of this instant classic. But before I did that, that’s when the tears finally flowed freely, overcome with seeing something I never thought would happen at the time when I needed a pick-me-up.
Baseball, man. It always gets me.
My grandfather and I had a great relationship. He liked baseball, but it wasn’t necessarily the strongest bond between us (that was with my Papou). Thanks to association, though, whenever I think of Johan Santana, I think of his no-hitter, and then I think of my grandpa.
Johan, thanks for giving me the smile I needed after a tough week, like you did for countless other Mets fans in different (or similar) situations. Let’s hope baseball comes back in some form for 2020, because with all the terrible things happening in the world — and specifically, in this country — lately, we could all use a temporary distraction to smile about right about now.
