MLB would’ve crushed Dodgers’ souls if Tyler Anderson actually completed no-hitter

Tyler Anderson has been a revelation for the Los Angeles Dodgers this season. Anderson has stepped up in the starting rotation and is yet another example of a cheap hidden gem found by Andrew Friedman and the front office.

The left-hander has an 8-0 record with a 2.82 ERA in 67 innings pitched. He currently has a career-high in ERA+ at 149 and ranks sixth in all of Major League Baseball with a 5.73 SO/BB ratio. His two no-hit bids enter the sixth inning or later in 10 starts this season have certainly helped that cause.

Most recently, he threw 8.1 innings of no-hit baseball before Shohei Ohtani ripped history away from Anderson with a triple in the ninth inning.

It’s probably a good thing that Ohtani ruined the fun that night, though, because MLB retroactively ended Anderson’s no-hit bid with two outs in the seventh inning. Wait, what? What are we talking about?

Anderson made a bad throw to first on a tapper in front of the mound, allowing Jared Walsh to reach safely and then get to second base. The play was originally ruled an error but, just under a week later, was changed to a base hit.

Dodgers fans would have every right to be furious if MLB took away Tyler Anderson’s no-hitter

There’s no way that MLB would have actually made this change if Anderson completed the no-hitter, right? To retroactively change history and take away an accomplishment like this would be the biggest blunder made in a game like this since Jim Joyce blew Armando Galarraga’s perfect game in the ancient days before video replay.

To be fair to MLB, however, if there was ever a play in which a pitcher intentionally recorded an error to keep a no-hitter alive it may have been this play. It was undoubtedly a tough play and does not fall in the routine category … but it still was fishy.

Anderson didn’t just spike the baseball, he threw it a few yards to the right of first base. He also turned instantly turned around to home-plate umpire Dan Bellino and appeared to say something. Was he instantly pleading his case for that to be an error … even though the umpire isn’t the one keeping score?

That’s something that only Anderson and Bellino know the answer to, but it’s clear that MLB thought there may have been some ulterior motives behind that bad throw.