Bunning, who pitched a no-hitter while with the Detroit Tigers against the Boston Red Sox in 1958, bettered himself with a spotless perfect game on June 21st of 1963, which was Father’s Day, appropriate for a guy who had seven children of his own!
He would finish the game with 10 strikeouts against the hapless Mets, and was helped in the game by a Johnny Callison home run, two runs batted in by his catcher Gus Triandos, as well as two RBI’s of his own on a double.
It would be the first perfect game in baseball during the regular season since Charlie Robertson of the Chicago White Sox in 1922.
Though surely one of the high-points of his career, he put together what would be a Hall of Fame tenure in the Majors, winning over 200 games, which consisted of more than 100 in each league, another rarity at the time.
Post career, as we all know, Bunning would go into politics, serving his home state of Kentucky for decades in various capacities, ultimately leading to a Senator’s seat after serving as a State Assemblyman.