Toronto Blue Jays at Boston Red Sox

Dylan Cease, standing on the mound with his hands reaching for the sky after throwing 120 pitches, didn’t look like a man on a 48-57 team. That’s why this matters. Cease’s talent is only matched by his stubbornness on these special days, creating an unstoppable force. In Saturday’s 6-0 win over the Red Sox, he threw the Blue Jays’ first complete game one-hitter in 16 years, another night flirting with history after he took a no-hitter into the ninth inning earlier this month. This matters to Cease, a pitcher who openly chases greatness. Manager John Schneider would have had to drag Cease off that mound in the ninth. On the second-last batter of the game, an animated Cease called his own challenge, then pumped his fist when it was overturned for strike three. He was ready to challenge the final pitch of the game, too, which was called for his 12th strikeout. For two hours and twenty-five minutes, he owned Fenway Park. "You don’t see this very often,” Schneider said. “Dylan is kind of a throwback pitcher. He’s durable and he thrives on that stuff. You don’t see this much. The no-hitter attempt in San Francisco, you just don’t see this much. Dylan is evolving as a pitcher. I wanted to give him every chance to finish it.” **By the numbers:** * This was Cease’s third career complete game. He threw another one-hitter in 2022 and his no-hitter against the Nationals on July 25, 2024. * The first one-hitter by a Blue Jays pitcher since Shaun Marcum on August 16, 2010. Eight days prior to that, Brandon Morrow had done the same while striking out 17. * Only 10 pitchers in franchise history have thrown a complete-game shutout with one or zero hits allowed (a combined 15 times). * His 120 pitches are a career high, the most in MLB this season and the most a pitcher has thrown since Justin Verlander threw 121 on Aug. 31, 2025. * Cease is the first pitcher to throw at least 118 pitches in two outings in the same season since teammate Shane Bieber, who did it in 2021 with the Guardians. * Cease is the second pitcher in the modern era to go eight-plus innings, allow no more than one hit and strike out 10 or more batters in consecutive road starts, joining Nolan Ryan in 1989, according to OptaSTATS. Let’s throw a fun fact on the pile, too. Schneider was Shaun Marcum’s roommate in High-A Dunedin and Triple-A Syracuse back in his playing days. It’s been a while.