Padres remain lone team without a no-hitter after D-Backs spoil latest bid

It was right there for the taking.

San Diego Padres starter Tyson Ross had not allowed a hit to the Arizona Diamondbacks through 7 2/3 innings on Friday night. After almost 50 years of Padres baseball, it would be Ross, the homegrown arm who returned to the organization after a one-year absence, who'd finally end the drought.

And then ... well, baseball fans in San Diego have seen this movie before:

Christian Walker's eighth-inning double spoiled Ross' bid for San Diego history, and extended one of the most notorious droughts in all of sports. The Padres are still the only active MLB franchise to have never thrown a no-hitter - a streak that now stands at 7,835 games (regular season and playoffs) and counting.

"It got close, but no cigar," Ross said after the Padres' 4-1 win, according to Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune.

There have been plenty of other close calls for the Padres. According to the website NoNoHitters.com, Friday was the 13th time that San Diego has held a team hitless through at least seven innings before losing the bid in the final two frames. Two of those lost gems were combined efforts, five ended up as one-hitters, and two potential no-hitters were lost with one out to go - including in 2011, when Luke Gregerson blew both a combined no-no and the game in spectacular fashion:

(Video courtesy: MLB.com)

To put the Padres' continuing no-hit futility into some perspective, consider that their pitchers have thrown 29 one-hitters (including Ross on Friday) since 1969. It took San Diego's 1969 expansion cousins, the Montreal Expos, only nine games to get their first no-hitter. And the Padres have been passed by younger franchises - Arizona, which broke up Friday's bid, has two no-hitters since 1998, while the Florida/Miami Marlins, established in 1993, have six.

The Padres have been no-hit by opposing pitchers nine times, including by a Hall of Fame knuckleballer, by the same pitcher twice in less than a year, by a complete unknown whose career lasted another 14 games, and even by a pitcher who was tripping on LSD the entire time. Maybe the only no-hit luck the Padres ever had was breaking up a Pedro Martinez perfect game - in the 10th inning.

Only the New York Mets took longer than the Padres to get a no-hitter; Johan Santana threw their first in 2012, in the Mets' 8,019th game. San Diego is now quickly closing in on that mark.

Everyone on the Padres knows about the streak, so on Friday, Ross - who missed most of the last two years because of thoracic outlet syndrome - threw 127 pitches while chasing history, a personal high that he never would have reached if not for the circumstances.

"I'm aware (of the streak)," manager Andy Green said. "We gave him (Ross) as much leash as humanly possible today. He did a heck of a job, I would have loved to see him get it."