Six days after his worst start as a Phillie, Roy Halladay turned in the best effort of his career: a perfect game against the Florida Marlins in Miami. The right-hander threw 115 pitches, striking out 11 among the 27 outs he notched.
With the Phillies' bats still in their week-long hibernation, the ace had no margin for error. The Phils scored their lone run in the third inning, when Marlins outfielder Cameron Maybin misjudged a Chase Utley fly ball that allowed Wilson Valdez to score from first. Fish starter Josh Johnson, who pitched a great game in his own right (7 innings, 7 hits, 1 walk, 6 strikeouts), stranded Utley at third after intentionally walking Ryan Howard with strikeouts of Jayson Werth and Raul Ibanez.
The rest was all Doc. While he ran a few three-ball counts, and got a couple nice defensive plays behind him from Valdez at short and Juan Castro at third, dominance was the rule. Chris Coughlan, Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla each struck out twice, with pinch-hitter Wes Helms Halladay's last victim via the K. Ronny Paulino grounded out to Castro to end it, as the always stoic Halladay pounded his glove just before getting mobbed at the mound.
Halladay's perfecto was the 20th in major league history (and second in less than a month, after Oakland A's starter Dallas Braden did it to the Tampa Bay Rays), and first in Phillies history since Jim Bunning accomplished the feat in 1964.
We've seen some great Phillies pitching performances in the last couple decades: no-hitters by Terry Mulholland and Tommy Greene, the dominance of Curt Schilling in the late '90s, Kevin Millwood's no-no in 2003, Cole Hamels in the '08 playoffs and Cliff Lee a year later. But no Phil had achieved perfection in my lifetime before tonight. Cherish it.