When David Wells recounted being hungover while pitching his famous perfect game
The two-time world champion, David Wells, threw a perfect game in 1998 while playing for the Yankees. Not many know, however, that he was fighting back a horrible hangover at the time.
The infamous game happened on 17 May 1998, when the Yankees were going up against the Minnesota Twins. The day before the fateful game, Wells attended Saturday Night Live with Jimmy Falon. Wells also attended the after-party of the show and got heavily drunk.
On the morning of the game, David Wells was severely hungover. In a 2021 interview with The New York Post, Wells described the day of the game in detail. He recalled feeling like a wreck; even after hydrating and filling his stomach, the pitcher was not doing well.
“I went to the park, I was a wreck. I mean, I was a wreck. (David Cone) told me, he goes, you need to go to Monahan’s office to get away from everybody, you stink," he said.
"So I just started chewing gum, drinking a lot of water and coffee, about ten trips to the bathroom. My stomach was boiling over pretty good. I don’t know, at about 11:30 I had a pancake in there from the spread and I felt a little bit better but I was still a wreck,” he added. “I knew if I had a short outing, I would’ve gotten in a lot of trouble. A lot of people knew I was pretty hammered.”
On this day 23 years ago, a hungover David Wells pitched a perfect game 🍻 https://t.co/X0LxOVK4HS
David Wells pitched the 15th perfect game in baseball history. The Yankees won against the Twins by a score of 4-0.
David Wells' teammates became superstitious on the day of his perfect game
On the day that David Wells pitched his perfect game, not only did the pitcher experience a horrible hangover, but he also experienced alienation from his teammates due to their superstitions.
When Wells returned after either the sixth or seventh innings, his Yankees teammates avoided him. They thought that if he was left as alone as before, he would continue to pitch a perfect game.
“I walked into the clubhouse to get water and I heard Michael Kay saying, ‘Boomer Wells has a perfect game,’ and I ran out of that room so quick and went back down into the dugout,” Wells said.
“Then, I don’t know, it was about the sixth, seventh inning. I think I went over to (Tino Martinez) and he got up and walked away. They wouldn’t sit by me. Nobody would talk to me. It was unbelievable, I was the lone man on the totem pole there.”
Any of you remember David Wells perfect game? https://t.co/OYIRkAHNPu
But it was probably not his alienation that led to David Wells pitching a perfect game. Many would consider Wells' sheer talent as the biggest factor that helped him that day.