Padres No-Hit For Six Innings, Shut Out By Dustin May 3-0 As Cards Take Opener

The San Diego Padres ran into a buzzsaw named Dustin May tonight, as the St. Louis Cardinals right-hander no-hit the Padres through six innings and wound up with a 3-0 complete-game shutout win. 

The Padres went with an opener to try to get more length from Lucas Giolito, and Wandy Peralta got it done with a scoreless first inning. Giolito was strong for the next two innings, but the Cardinals broke through in the fourth with a pair of runs, scoring on a single by Lars Nootbar, an infield hit by Masyn Winn and a two-run double by Jimmy Crooks to give St. Louis a 2-0 lead. 

The Cardinals padded their lead in the fifth inning on a double by Alec Burleson that drove Ivan Herrera after Herrera walked, but this one was really all about May. 

The Padres did nothing against him, literally, as they failed to get a hit or a walk through the first six. May lost his perfect game in the seventh when Fernando Tatis Jr. earned a leadoff walk, and Manny Machado took the no-hitter away with a ground ball single to left that found the hole between short and third. But Masyn Winn played some stellar defense to stop the rally with a double play on a grounder by Gavin Sheets. 

Giolito wound up leaving after the sixth, as he gave the Padres five innings and gave up three runs, with his final line including seven hits three walks and a pair of strikeouts. He got no support, of course, but Giolito ended up taking the loss as  Kyle Hart pitched a pair of scoreless innings after that.

May recovered from the Padres brief blip in the eighth as he struck out the side, and that inning also became something of a landmark for him as it was the furthest he’d gone so far in his career. 

He extended that record with a scoreless ninth, and May was extremely economical throughout the night. He wound up throwing just 101 pitches has he used a combination of high heat and a devastating breaking ball to keep Padres hitters off balance all night. 

The Padres will get manager Craig Stammen back tomorrow night, as the manager and reliever Ron Marinaccio were suspended for the beanball war that took place in Baltimore over the weekend. Marinaccio got a three game suspension, so he’ll be out a little longer.