Justin Verlander was a Hall of Famer long before he had Tommy John surgery in his late 30s, returned to win a Cy Young Award with the Houston Astros last year, and inked a mega-money deal with the New York Mets. He’s from Goochland, VA after all, and if that’s not an automatic entry to the Hall, I don’t know what is.
Anyway, Verlander looked like his vintage self in shutting down the Cincinnati Reds offense on Wednesday evening. The 40 year old limited the Reds to just 2 hits over 7.0 IP, with the Reds doing all of their offending in the Bottom of the 1st before an untimely TOOTBLAN ended what would be their lone rally of the day.