October 8, 1956. A Monday afternoon at Yankee Stadium. The New York Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers, tied two games apiece in the World Series, and 64,519 fans settling into their seats for Game 5. Don Larsen had the ball. Four days earlier, the Dodgers had knocked him out in the second inning of Game 2 — four runs, quick hook, the kind of start that ends a man’s October. Now Casey Stengel was sending him back out. Nobody in the building knew they were about to watch the most singular pitching performance in baseball history.

The Setup

The 1956 World Series was a rematch. Brooklyn had beaten the Yankees in seven games in 1955 — the only championship in Dodgers history — and the Bronx wanted it back. But Brooklyn grabbed Games 1 and 2 at Ebbets Field, and the Yankees looked shaky. Whitey Ford and Tom Sturdivant steadied things in Games 3 and 4 at the Stadium, knotting the series at two apiece. Game 5 was a swing game. Whoever won it would need just one more.

Larsen’s path to the mound that afternoon made no logical sense. He’d gone 3-21 with the Baltimore Orioles in 1954 — one of the worst records for a starting pitcher in modern baseball. The Yankees acquired him that November in a 17-player deal (one of the largest trades the game had ever seen), believing his raw stuff was better than his record showed. He rewarded that faith with an 11-5 regular season in ’56, but he was the fourth starter at best in a rotation fronted by Ford (19-6).

Then came the Game 2 disaster at Ebbets Field. Larsen couldn’t get through two innings. Brooklyn won 13-8. The man who’d pitch the greatest game ever thrown didn’t survive the second inning of his previous start.

Stengel told him the way Stengel told pitchers — or so the story goes — by placing a baseball in the toe of his warm-up shoe before he arrived at the clubhouse. No conversation. No pep talk. Just the ball in the shoe.

The Game

Larsen took the rubber with an unusual delivery he’d adopted during the regular season — no traditional windup, no big leg kick. He stood straight up on the mound, looked in at Yogi Berra, and threw. The stripped-down mechanics gave hitters nothing to time. Berra called every pitch. Larsen didn’t shake him off once.

Jim Gilliam, Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snider — all retired in the first inning. Jackie Robinson, Gil Hodges, Roy Campanella followed. Inning after inning, the same result. Three up, three down. The Dodgers lineup had five future Hall of Famers in it (Snider, Robinson, Reese, Campanella, and Hodges), and none of them could do a thing.

Mickey Mantle gave Larsen the only run he’d need in the fourth, turning on a Sal Maglie fastball and driving it into the right field seats. The Yankees added a second run in the sixth on a Hank Bauer RBI single. The score sat at 2-0, and Maglie — “The Barber,” one of the toughest competitors in the National League — was pitching well enough to win on almost any other afternoon. He allowed just five hits across nine innings. On this day, it didn’t matter.

By the fifth inning, the crowd knew something was happening. Larsen had retired 15 straight Dodgers without a baserunner. Then Hodges — the most dangerous power hitter in the Brooklyn lineup after Snider — drove a ball deep to left-center. Mantle broke at the crack of the bat, sprinted to his left, and hauled it in with a backhanded catch at full extension. The ball that would’ve killed the perfect game died in Mantle’s glove. It’s the play that saved everything, and Mantle made it look like a drill.

By the seventh, the crowd stood for every pitch. The Yankees dugout had gone silent — baseball’s oldest superstition demands that nobody speak to a pitcher during a no-hitter, and this was something beyond a no-hitter. No hits. No walks. No hit batsmen. No errors. Nothing.

By the eighth, with 24 Dodgers retired in order, the tension inside the Stadium was almost unbearable. His final pitch count landed at 97, and through eight he’d thrown somewhere around 80 (an absurdly efficient pace for what he was doing). Andy Carey handled a tough chance at third. Gil McDougald stayed steady at short. The defense played clean behind him all day.

Final ScoreYankees 2, Dodgers 0Innings Pitched9 (complete game)Batters Faced27Hits Allowed0Walks0Strikeouts7Pitch Count97Losing PitcherSal Maglie (5 H, 2 R, 9 IP)
The Ninth

Carl Furillo led off. He flew out to Hank Bauer in right field. Twenty-five up, twenty-five down.

Roy Campanella grounded to Billy Martin at second. Twenty-six up, twenty-six down.

Brooklyn manager Walter Alston sent Dale Mitchell to the plate as a pinch-hitter. Mitchell was a career .312 hitter who almost never struck out — one of the most contact-oriented batters in the game (119 strikeouts in 3,984 career at-bats, which is borderline absurd). The worst possible matchup for a pitcher trying to finish off perfection.

Larsen worked the count to 1-2. He went into his no-windup stance, stared in at Berra, and threw a fastball on the outside corner. Home plate umpire Babe Pinelli — working the final game of a career that spanned 22 seasons in the National League, and he’d already announced his retirement before the Series started — punched his right hand into the air. Strike three. Called.

Mitchell turned and stared. He told anyone who’d listen for the rest of his life that the pitch was outside. Pinelli defended the call until the day he died. The debate hasn’t been settled. It won’t be.

I don’t know why I jumped on him. I just did.

— Yogi Berra, after the final out

The instant Pinelli’s arm went up, Berra launched himself from his crouch and sprinted to the mound. He leaped into Larsen’s arms, legs around his waist, hands around his neck. Larsen caught him. The photograph became the most reproduced image in World Series history — pure, unscripted joy, the catcher hanging off the pitcher like a kid who just saw his father come home from the war.

The Aftermath

Twenty-seven up. Twenty-seven down. No pitcher had ever thrown a perfect game in the World Series before Don Larsen did it. No pitcher has done it since. No pitcher has thrown a perfect game in any postseason game, period. The achievement stands alone in baseball — 70 years and counting.

I was so weak in the knees out there in the ninth inning, I thought I was going to faint. Every pitch felt like the most important one I ever threw.

— Don Larsen, to reporters in the clubhouse

The perfect game gave the Yankees a 3-2 series lead, but Brooklyn forced a Game 7 by winning Game 6 behind Clem Labine’s 10-inning complete-game shutout, 1-0. It didn’t matter. Johnny Kucks shut out the Dodgers 9-0 in Game 7 at Ebbets Field, with Berra hitting two home runs, Elston Howard going deep, and Bill Skowron launching a grand slam. The Yankees took the title in seven games — revenge for 1955.

Larsen pitched in the majors until 1967, bouncing from Kansas City to the White Sox to San Francisco to Houston to Baltimore and finally the Cubs. His career record settled at 81-91 with a 3.78 ERA. A journeyman by any honest measure. He died on January 1, 2020, at age 90 in Hayden, Idaho, and every obituary led with the same nine innings.

The Barber Got Shaved

Sal Maglie’s performance in the losing effort deserves better than a footnote. “The Barber” — so named because he liked to pitch inside, giving hitters a close shave — threw nine innings of five-hit, two-run ball against the Yankees. On almost any other day in October, that line wins you the game. He lost 2-0 to a man who retired every batter he faced. Maglie told reporters afterward that he’d pitched well enough to beat anyone. He was right. He just didn’t pitch against anyone.

1954The 3-21 Season

Larsen posts one of the worst records in modern baseball history with the Baltimore Orioles. The Yankees see through it and grab him in a 17-player trade that November.

October 5, 1956Game 2 Disaster

Larsen starts Game 2 of the World Series at Ebbets Field and gets knocked out in the second inning. Brooklyn wins 13-8 and takes a 2-0 series lead.

October 8, 1956The Perfect Game

Larsen retires all 27 Brooklyn Dodgers batters in Game 5 at Yankee Stadium. Final score: 2-0. Berra catches every pitch. Pinelli calls the final strike of his career.

October 10, 1956Series Clinched

The Yankees win Game 7 at Ebbets Field 9-0. Johnny Kucks pitches a shutout. Berra and Skowron power the offense. The club takes the title in seven games.

January 1, 2020Larsen Dies at 90

Don Larsen passes away in Hayden, Idaho. Every obituary opens with the same nine innings from October 1956.

Frequently Asked QuestionsHas there ever been a perfect game in the World Series?

Once. Don Larsen of the Yankees threw the only perfect game in World Series history on October 8, 1956, retiring all 27 Brooklyn Dodgers batters in a 2-0 Game 5 victory at Yankee Stadium. No pitcher in any postseason game — World Series, LCS, Division Series, or Wild Card — has matched it before or since.

Who caught Don Larsen’s perfect game?

Yogi Berra caught every pitch. He called the entire game, and Larsen didn’t shake off a single sign. When Dale Mitchell struck out to end it, Berra sprinted to the mound and leaped into Larsen’s arms — producing one of the most famous photographs in baseball history.

Was Don Larsen a good pitcher outside of the perfect game?

Larsen finished his career with an 81-91 record and a 3.78 ERA across 14 major league seasons. He went 3-21 with the Orioles in 1954 and bounced between seven teams after leaving the Yankees. The perfect game was a lightning strike — the greatest single-game performance in baseball history, thrown by a man whose career was otherwise unremarkable.