The Day Babe Ruth Punched an Umpire and His Replacement Threw a No-Hitter

On June 23, 1917, Babe Ruth was still a pitcher. He was 22 years old, throwing for the Boston Red Sox, and he was having a very good season. He entered his start against the Washington Senators with a 12-4 record and complete games in his previous seven starts.

He faced one batter.

Ruth's first pitch to Washington second baseman Ray Morgan was called a ball by home plate umpire Brick Owens. So were the next three. Morgan walked on four pitches. Ruth was convinced at least two of them were strikes, and he let Owens know it from the mound.

The exchange, as reported in the Boston Globe the following day, went roughly like this. Ruth yelled at Owens to open his eyes. Owens told him to get back on the mound or he'd be thrown out of the game. Ruth yelled that if Owens threw him out, he'd punch him in the nose.

Owens threw him out. Ruth charged the plate.

Accounts differ on the details. The Globe reported that Ruth swung with both hands, missed with a left, and connected with a right behind Owens' left ear. The Baseball Hall of Fame's account says Ruth hit Owens in the head, behind his ear. Ruth's own autobiography gives a different sequence of events entirely. What everyone agrees on is that Ruth hit the umpire, was restrained by players and manager Jack Barry, and was dragged off the field with the help of several policemen. Catcher Pinch Thomas, who had tried to get between Ruth and Owens, was also ejected.

The Red Sox now needed a pitcher. Barry handed the ball to Ernie Shore, a 26-year-old right-hander who had pitched five innings just two days earlier and was not expecting to play. Shore got eight warm-up pitches and a new catcher, Sam Agnew.

On Shore's first pitch, Morgan took off for second base. Agnew threw him out. Shore then retired the next 26 batters in order. No hits. No walks. No errors. No baserunner of any kind.

The Red Sox won 4-0. Shore had faced 26 batters and recorded 27 outs (counting the caught stealing). For decades, the game was classified as a perfect game for Shore. In 1991, Major League Baseball's Committee on Statistical Accuracy reclassified it as a combined no-hitter, since Ruth had technically been the starting pitcher and had allowed a baserunner. Shore's accomplishment was downgraded on a technicality 74 years after the fact.

Ruth was fined $100, suspended for ten days, and required to make a public apology. He went on to finish the season 24-13 with a 2.01 ERA. The following year, his manager started letting him play in the field on his non-pitching days, and Ruth began hitting home runs at a rate that nobody had ever seen before. Within three years, he was sold to the Yankees, and the greatest pitching career that never fully happened gave way to the greatest hitting career that ever did.

Ernie Shore pitched in the majors until 1920, finishing with a 65-43 record and a 2.47 ERA. He won three World Series games for the Red Sox. After baseball, he became the sheriff of Forsyth County, North Carolina, and served for 34 years. He is remembered almost exclusively for one game in which he was not supposed to pitch.