The LSD No-hitter....great story....

A high walk total in a no-hitter is not unusual. Often the ball is moving at an abnormal rate, which makes it hard to hit and hard to control. There are 19 no-hitters with at least six walks. Jim Maloney (1965) walked 10 in a no-hitter, AJ Burnett walked nine (2001) and Johnny Vander Meer walked eight (1938). None of them claimed to be on LSD.

Ellis threw at all the Cincinnati Reds hitters because he thought the Reds hitters were too comfortable against Pittsburgh pitchers. At that point, the Reds had beaten the Pirates in two playoff series.

I dealt with Ellis and while he was an engaging character, he was also a bullshitter of the highest order. Based on what I know about him and the anecdotal evidence of friends who experimented with LSD, I am 99 percent certain that the LSD no-hitter is Dock's greatest bullshitting.

 

I had always heard a story that in 1976, Ellis (with the Yankees) faced Reggie Jackson (with the Orioles) for the first time since Jackson hit that mammoth home run during the '71 All-Star Game at Tiger Stadium. Ellis' first pitch hit Jackson in the head.

I'm not sure how true that is, because I went to Retrosheet.org and couldn't find a game that season where Ellis hit Jackson. Maybe it's a different year, but that story - if true - is something else.

 

Awesome ...

"Baseball today: San Diego vs. Pittsburgh."

"Starting pitcher ... YOU, SUCKA!!"

 

Ellis hit Jackson with a pitch in a game on June 27, 1976. It was Jackson's fourth plate appearance of the game and the Yankees were leading 4-0 in the eighth inning. It was the fifth time Jackson batted against Ellis that season.

 

This.

 

There's no effin' way Ellis pitched. much less threw a no-hitter, on LSD, unless he was at the tail, tail end of the trip.

If that happened, then Lary Sorenson threw a complete game with a .48 BAC as well.

 

Mythbusters should do an episode trying to debunk this. Get a sample of five pitchers (college, minor leaguers), hide all their identities, give a few LSD and give a few a placebo. See what happens.

 

As batshit crazy as Dock Ellis is he probably THOUGHT he was on LSD that day.

 

Was. The Good Doctor died last December from cirrhosis.

 

My guess is that he may have taken some LSD in the days preceding the game, and he embellished the story well after the fact because he 1. Was working as a drug counselor and needed a dramatic story and 2. Loved attention, and wasn't getting much after his baseball days ended.

Based on what I've been told by people who used LSD, it would be pretty much impossible to remember the path to the mound, the rules of baseball and how to pitch if he had truly been under the influence of LSD.

 

Very interesting and entertaining.
I'd like to see some actual video of the no-no spliced into that film.
Very cool, indeed.

 

I don't care if it is bullshit, which it probably is, it's a great story anyway. If it was bullshit, it might even make it greater that Ellis perpetuated it for so long.