Immaculate Inning (What’s it mean, Examples, and More!)

by

While no-hitters and perfect games get most of the notoriety and attention from the national media when they occur, there is a niche pitching statistic that is debatably just as impressive called the immaculate inning.

An immaculate inning is when a pitcher throws just nine pitches in one inning resulting in three consecutive strikeouts. 

Throwing an immaculate inning in high school or college may happen more frequently than in the big leagues because of the disparity in competition from team to team. 

When MLB pitchers complete an immaculate inning, there is no second guessing how legit the feat is because they are facing the best hitters in the world.

Amount of Immaculate Innings

 

Immaculate Innings

No-Hitters

Perfect Games

Amount in Baseball History

112

318

27

There have only been 112 immaculate innings in baseball history, with the number of immaculate innings rising over the last few decades.

As training methods improve over time, it only makes sense that pitchers are getting bigger and stronger and, thus, throwing at higher velocities than ever before and more capable of completing immaculate innings. 

Throughout Major League Baseball history, there have been 112 Immaculate innings, with the majority of them being thrown since 1990. If you look at the historical fastball averages over time, there is a direct correlation between the time when pitchers started to throw into the 90s on average and the frequency of immaculate innings happening.

Since Fangraphs began keeping records of fastball velocities in 2002, the average fastball velocity has slowly climbed from 89mph in 2002 to 93.6 in 2022. 

MLB History Immaculate Innings Year

Year

Amount of Immaculate Innings

2022

6

2021

5

2020

1

2019

8

2018

4

2017

8

2016

1

2015

2

2014

7

2013

2

2012

2

2011

2

2000-2010

15

1990-1999

17

1980-1989

4

1970-1979

8

Most Recent Immaculate Innings

1. Enyel De Los Santos

De Los Santos used his complete arsenal in 2022 to register the most recent immaculate inning. 

2. Hayden Wesneski

Wesneski is not a power pitcher, but he used his sharp slider early in the count and kept hitters guessing throughout the nine pitches he threw.

3. Ryan Helsley

Helsley fits the profile of someone who could throw multiple immaculate innings throughout his career. He throws 100MPH and has a sharp swing and miss the 90MPH slider that is virtually unhittable when he locates it.

4. Reid Detmers

Detmers used his hard fastball and sharp breaking from the left side for his immaculate inning in 2022

5. Phil Maton and Luis Garcia

Phil Maton and Luis Garcia pitched immaculate innings in the same game to the same three batters in 2022! This feat will likely never be duplicated in major league history ever again

6. Nestor Cortes

Despite not having overpowering stuff, Cortes has emerged as one of the game’s best-lefthanded pitchers. He can locate all of his pitches at any time in the count, which is another typical quality of pitchers that have thrown an immaculate inning before.

3 Typical skills of Immaculate Inning Pitchers

1. High Velocity

If you can throw close to 100MPH, you have a great chance to miss barrels due to hitters being unable to catch up.

Throwing this hard makes your other offspeed pitches much better because hitters are spending time thinking about how they can catch up to your fastball.

2. Exceptional Breaking Ball

Major League pitchers with sharp curveballs or sliders have a higher chance of pitching an immaculate inning because they can generate looking strikeouts or swing-and-miss strikes with more regularity. 

As seen in the videos above, many immaculate innings have been thrown by pitchers that throw sharp-breaking balls early in the count and keep hitters off balance. Early-count curveballs that are thrown for strikes can be a game-changer for pitchers.

Most hitters are sitting fastballs early in the count and will be caught off guard by breaking pitches, so if you can locate your breaking ball at any time, try using it early in at-bats!

3. Great Control of Multiple Pitches

Mastering 1 pitch that pitchers can throw for strikes can be hard for many pitchers, but throwing 3-4 at any time for strikes and you should have a great pitching career even if you don’t have exceptional pitching velocity.

Some of the game’s greats, like Greg Maddux, threw a two-seam and four-seam fastball, cutter, sinker, and circle changeup threw 5 or more pitches that they could locate at any time in the game!

4. Confidence and Focus

Throwing nine pitches in a row takes focus and concentration, but mixing in multiple pitch types for nine strikes in a row that result in three straight strikeouts takes another level of confidence in throwing any pitch at any moment. 

Has anyone ever thrown two immaculate innings?

A few major league baseball pitchers have thrown two immaculate innings, and even some have thrown three immaculate innings throughout their careers. 

Here is a breakdown of the list of pitchers with multiple immaculate innings thrown

  • Max Scherzer: 3 
  • Sandy Koufax: 3
  • Chris Sale: 3 
  • Kevin Gausman: 2
  • Randy Johnson: 2
  • Nolan Ryan: 2

This is a pretty small list of pitchers that have thrown 2 or more immaculate innings, and everyone has a filthy pitching repertoire. 

One of my favorite pitchers of all time was Randy Johnson. The Big Unit fits the profile of someone that has the dominant stuff needed to strike out the side on 9 pitches. Nolan Ryan was my favorite right-handed pitcher and had equally as impressive of stuff from the right side.

When was the first official immaculate inning?

The first documented immaculate inning occurred in 1902 by Philadelphia Athletics pitcher Rube Waddell against the Orioles.

Final Word

Immaculate innings take an exceptional amount of focus and skill for major league baseball pitchers pull off. The one takeaway from my research on this topic is that nearly every pitcher throwing one has one or more plus-plus (scouting term for exceptional) pitches. 

If you want to achieve an immaculate inning at some point in your pitching career, work on building above-average velocity and locating your breaking pitches, get aggressive if you have momentum in an inning where you strike out the first batter on three pitches and go for it!