IStock Photo 7870014 © Rob Friedman

Think of the poor Rays.

What must it feel like to have your entire side go up to the plate—and go right back down? No hits, no walks, no luck.

It happened to the Rays last July, when the White Sox’s Mark Buehrle did not allow a single Tampa Bay Rays batter to reach base—becoming the first American League pitcher in 10 years to throw a perfect game. The feat is so rare that in the entire history of MLB baseball, the July 23, 2009 feat marked only the 18th time a pitcher had reached the end of the 9th inning with the scoreboard recording a straight line of zeroes.

The odds a Major League game will be a perfect game are 1 in 11,500. It is slightly more likely that a male in the US is named Mary (1 in 11,110).

The chance the Rays would face such a humiliation twice in anyone’s lifetime? You have to think Tampa Bay was pretty confident the odds were in their favor.

Then came Mother’s Day.

Twenty-six-year-old Dallas Braden of the Oakland Athletics pitched the perfect game. After the final out, Braden pointed toward heaven, to honor his mother, who had passed away while he was still in high school. Perhaps it was a bit of thanks as well, because it seemed possible some maternal, or even divine, assistance, had come the way of the 24th round draft pick, enabling him to live every pitcher’s ultimate dream—racking up a perfect slate against the hottest team in baseball.

The last time the A’s had a perfect game, America was still fighting the Vietnam War. But with two American League perfect games in back-to-back seasons, it is worth wondering if both Braden and Buehrle have an advantage over National League pitchers. Since baseball’s modern era began in 1900, there have only been 17 years blessed with a perfect game—and only four belong to National League pitchers. In fact, the NL did not have its first modern-day perfect game until 1964 when Jim Bunning retired 27 Mets in a row on Father’s Day. Sandy Koufax tossed a perfect game the following year, and the league had to wait another 23 years for the next one. Since then there have only been three National League pitchers to accomplish the feat: Tom Browning in 1988, Dennis Martinez in 1991, and Randy Johnson in 2004.

In comparison, The American League has had nearly three times as many perfect games as its rival league. Since 1900, AL pitchers have thrown at least one in every decade except for three. The accomplishment appears to be counterintuitive, being that the AL lineups are much deeper due to the inclusion of the designated hitter. But perhaps not having to worry about their batting skills—and thus concentrating solely on the job at hand—gives AL pitchers just enough of an edge.