Remembering Roy Halladay’s Short, Incredible Run with Phillies

The Philadelphia Phillies acquired Roy Halladay before the 2010 season in the hopes that it would help push them back to the World Series.

It didn’t quite work out that way, but he produced a pair of glorious seasons along the way.

Recently, The Athletic (subscription required) recently selected its all-quarter century team. Jayson Stark, who wrote the piece, installed Halladay as one of the five best pitchers from 2000 to today.

While the bulk of his career was with the Toronto Blue Jays, it’s worth looking back on Halladay’s time with the Phillies.

Remembering Roy Halladay’s Phillies Career

After the 2009 season, the Phillies acquired Halladay via trade. Philadelphia gave up minor league prospects Travis d'Arnaud, Kyle Drabek, and Michael Taylor to acquire the Cy Young winner. He spent 12 seasons with the Blue Jays and, at 33 years old, he was chasing a World Series. So were the Phillies.

That first season — in 2010, was glorious.

On May 29 he threw the 20th perfect game in MLB history against the Marlins he struck out 11. Then in the National League Division Series, he started Game 1 and threw the second no-hitter in postseason, as his performance joined Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series.

He also became the first pitcher since Nolan Ryan in 1973 to throw two no-hitters in a season and the seventh to throw a no-hitter and a perfect game in the same season.

He went 21-10 with a 2.44 ERA in 33 starts. He led the Majors with nine complete games and four shutouts. He also had 219 strikeouts. He became the first Phillies pitcher to win 20 games in a season since Steve Carlton in 1982 and the first Philadelphia right-hander since Robin Roberts in 1955. Halladay won his second career Cy Young and became the rare pitcher to win the award in both leagues.

In 2011, he finished second in NL Cy Young voting as he went 19-6 with a 2.35 ERA in 32 starts, with an NL-best eight complete games as he struck out 220.

His performance took a downturn in his final two seasons. He went 11-8 in 2012 and 4-5 in 2013 before he retired.

In four seasons with Philadelphia, he went 55-29 with a 3.25 ERA, with 622 strikeouts and 127. walks. For his career he went 203-105 with a 3.38 ERA, with 2,117 strikeouts and 592 walks.

After he opted to retire in 2013, he signed a one-day contract with Toronto to retire a Blue Jay. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2017 and had his number retired by Toronto. He died in November of 2017 in a plane crash in Florida.