AND YOU CAN PUT IT IN THE HISTORY BOOOOOOOOKS, YYYYYYYES!!!!!

Congratulations Mark Buehrle, you've just become the 18th person in history to toss a perfect game.





Buehrle, pitching in a game that placed the White Sox in a virtual tie with their rival Tigers team, had a day that will be remembered in the history looks for a long time. Not only is this the 18th perfect game in over 120 years of professional baseball, it is the first game in which a grand slam was hit. But that was not the most impressive statistic.

Buehrle has became the 24th pitcher to throw multiple no-hitters in a career. He is also one of only six other pitchers to have tossed two no-hitters, one of which included a perfect game. The other pitchers on the list include Cy Young, Addie Joss, Jim Bunning, Sandy Koufax and Randy Johnson. With the exception of Johnson, who has 300 career wins, all of the pitchers to accomplish this feat are enshrined in Cooperstown's famed Baseball's Hall of Fame (and yes, Johnson will be there someday).

It is at this time that we now begin to ask the question, is Mark Buehrle a Hall of Famer? In a nine year career, he is a four-time All-Star, has pitched two no-hitters (granted, a lot of HoF pitchers have not thrown one, and a lot of not so HoFers have -- see Hideo Nomo), and was a big part of the 2005 White Sox World Series championship.

So far pretty good. But what about comparisons? How would he rank against a probable Hall of Famer (Johan Santana) and a possible Hall of Famer (Mike Mussina)?

To be fair, we used the following criteria. All three played (for the most part) in the American League during the same era (1992-2009), played for teams with fairly successfull season records, and are being shown their career records up to the age of 30 (meaning that they may not have played the same amount of games, but they at least have an accurate sampling timeline).

------ Mike Mussina vs. Mark Buehrle vs. Johan Santana
Wins:--------136 ------------ 132 ------------- 120
Losses:-------66 ------------- 90 --------------- 58
W-L%:------.673 ----------- .595 ------------ .674
ERA:---------3.50 ----------- 3.78 ------------ 3.10
IP:----------1772.0 --------- 1973.0 -------- 1666.1
WHIP:------1.174 ---------- 1.264 ----------- 1.109
All-Stars:-----5 -------------- 4 ----------------- 4
Top 5 CYA:---5 -------------- 1 ----------------- 5
Gold Gloves:-4 -------------- 0 ----------------- 1

Through these numbers, a pattern starts to develop. First, Buehrle has a much lower winning percentage, a higher ERA, and -- despite his comparable All-Star appearances -- only one season in the top five of Cy Young voting. On that note, Buehrle finished at five while Mussina and Santana each had an additional season where they finished sixth in Cy Young voting.

So, perhaps he's not quite the Hall of Famer that his historical achievement may indicate, but he is the only one of the three with a World Series ring. But for a single day at least, Marke Buehrle was perfect. No one can ever say they pitched better than he did on that day. Congratulations Mark.