MLB News: Dodgers Star Won’t Lose Sleep Missing Out On Perfect Game

Clayton Kershaw of the Los Angeles Dodgers is a future Hall of Famer and a perfect game could have cemented that. He came close to it against the Minnesota Twins before he was pulled out by Dodgers manager Dave Roberts.

The 34-year-old was doing well for 7 innings before Roberts took him out in favor of Alex Vesia. The Dodgers went on to win even if Vesia surrendered a hit to Gary Sanchez in the eighth inning, 7-0.

However, baseball fans rued the chance of Kershaw possibly getting his first career-perfect game. It would have been also only the 24th perfect game in MLB history.

Kershaw has been struggling with injuries over the past years and the decision to pull him out was seen as a measure to preserve the three-time National League Cy Young Award winner, MLB.com reported.

Also, Kershaw had to deal with shortened spring training. And while the reasons behind Roberts' decision to pull out the eight-time All-Star seemed reasonable, MLB fans were left pretty upset.

For his part, Kershaw showed no complaints about being deprived of getting his first perfect MLB game. Rather, he said that it was the right move.

“Blame it on the lockout, blame it on me not picking up a baseball until January,” Kershaw stated. “My slider was horrible the last two innings. It didn’t have the bite. It was time.”

Kershaw is coming off a left forearm injury and also had a platelet-rich plasma injection back in October. This contributed to depriving the 2014 NL MVP of getting in proper work in the offseason.

Regardless, Kershaw’s showing was remarkable and even drew praise from Minnesota Twins manager Rocco Baldelli.

“Kershaw went out there and was as impressive as any pitcher that you’ll see in this game,” Baldelli said. “His slider was a pitch that I think in some ways kinda took over the game for a really long stretch.”