Who Will Throw the Next No-Hitter?

Two nights ago, Chris Heston threw the first no-hitter of the 2015 season. It was an impressive game, with Heston striking out 11 Mets hitters and getting 13 more to ground out, one for a double play. There were only two flyball outs. According to Baseball Info Solutions’ (BIS) Range and Positioning System, there were only two balls put into play that had a higher than 50 percent chance of being a base hit: a groundball hit by Ruben Tejada in the seventh inning and a groundball hit by Wilmer Flores in the eighth. However, both were easily turned into outs because Brandon Belt was well positioned, playing deep into the hole between first and second base. In fact, every play the Giants made on defense was easy. The video scouts at BIS rate the difficulty of every ball in play on a 1-5 scale, with 1 being routine and 5 being impossible, and there was not a single play given a higher rating than a 2 during that game.

So now that the first no-hitter of 2015 is out of the way, who is going to throw the next one? Every year in the Bill James Handbook, we publish a list of the most likely pitchers to throw a no-hitter during the upcoming season in the Career Targets section of the book. The system for determining the likelihood of throwing a no-hitter is based on a pitcher’s projected games started, innings pitched, strikeouts, hits allowed, and double plays induced.

Here are the most likely no-hitter candidates from the 2015 Bill James Handbook:

This list obviously includes the best and biggest arms in baseball. While pitchers like Chris Heston can sneak up on us with a no-hitter, the household names are still the guys that are most likely to achieve the feat.

Clayton Kershaw threw his first career no-hitter in 2014, and he is the favorite to throw another one this year. However, while he is still pitching well this season, compared to his career results he has been struggling a bit.

When we look at the second name on the list, though, we see a guy that may be building toward something special. Over his last six starts, Chris Sale has thrown at least 7.0 innings every time, and he has thrown 8.0 innings in four of those six starts; he has double-digit strikeouts in five of those six starts, including each of his last four games; and he has only allowed one run to score in his last three starts combined. Three starts ago, he shut out Baltimore over 7.2 innings while allowing only four hits, and two starts ago he shut out Texas over 7.0 innings while allowing only three hits. If I had to pick anyone to be the next to throw a no-hitter, Sale currently looks like the most likely guy.