You don’t talk about no-hitters.
You just don’t.
But Dock Ellis never cared much for norms. He once vowed to hit every single Reds hitter he faced and then made good on his word. He wore hair curlers on the field. He complained about the size of his bed in hotels on the way to helping the Pirates win the 1971 World Series. He lit pitching charts on fire in the visiting clubhouse in Cleveland.
Really, the fact that Ellis was chatting up his Pittsburgh Pirates teammates while throwing a no-hitter against the Padres at San Diego Stadium was the least interesting thing about his effort on this date — June 12 — in 1970.