As a 27-year-old former independent leaguer with a mid-80s fastball Andrew Albers simply being called up by the Twins was a helluva story. And then the soft-tossing left-hander threw 8.1 shutout innings in his big-league debut last week.
But wait, it gets even better. For his encore last night Albers tossed a complete-game shutout against the Indians, beginning his MLB career with 17.1 scoreless innings just three years after pitching in the independent Canadian-American Association.
Here’s a list of all the pitchers in baseball history to throw at least eight shutout innings in each of their first two games:
Andrew Albers 2013
Tom Phoebus 1966
Karl Spooner 1954
Al Worthington 1953
Dave Ferriss 1945
Johnny Marcum 1933
That’s it. That’s the whole list. A total of six pitchers and Albers is the first one to do it in nearly 50 years.
