Chris Bosio

Following the final out of his no-hitter against the Boston Red Sox last Thursday, Seattle Mariner pitcher Chris Bosio thrust his arms toward the roof of the Kingdome and stood as if he were frozen. "I didn't know what to do, or what to say," Bosio remembers. "My mind was racing a million miles an hour, thinking about all that has happened the last three or four weeks."

During spring training Bosio had endured the most troubling month of his life: His home in northern California was robbed; a good friend, Cleveland Indian pitcher Tim Crews, was killed in a boating accident; a woman living in the apartment below his in Phoenix shot her daughter and then killed herself; his grandfather died. "Anything that could have possibly happened to anyone, happened to me," Bosio says. "It has been tough."

Around March 17, a drifter allegedly broke into Bosio's house in Shingle Springs, Calif. The man didn't just rob the house; he lived in it for a week, pretending to be the gardener. He crashed Bosio's moped, cutting his knee and leaving a trail of blood in the house. He stole clothes, a fax machine and kitchen utensils. After about a week, Bosio's contractor discovered the man and called the police, who arrested him. Bosio left camp in Arizona as soon as he learned of the arrest, but by the time he got home, the drifter had already been freed on bail and had returned to Bosio's house, kicked in the garage door and stolen more of his belongings. Police arrested the man again.

When Bosio and his wife, Suzanne, returned to Phoenix on March 26, Suzanne was met at their apartment door by police, who informed her of the shooting downstairs. Three days later, Bosio was pulled off the mound to answer an urgent phone call from Suzanne: His grandfather, with whom he was very close, had died. Bosio headed back to northern California for the funeral. "I couldn't wait for the season to start," he said last week. "Spring training was a nightmare."

But the start of the season wasn't much consolation. In his first three starts Bosio was 0-1 with a 4.58 ERA—not what was expected from a player who had finished 16-6 with the Milwaukee Brewers last season and then had signed a four-year, $15.25 million contract as a free agent with the Mariners. And he got off to a shaky start in his fourth outing last Thursday, walking the first two Red Sox hitters.

Bosio, however, got the next 27 outs in order for the first no-hitter of his career—a four-strikeout, 97-pitch gem. Boston hit a number of balls hard in the 7-0 loss, but Bosio was aided by terrific defense, most notably by slick-fielding shortstop Omar Vizquel. With two out in the ninth inning, Ernest Riles hit a chopper over Bosio's head, but Vizquel bare-handed the bouncer and gunned down Riles by two steps.

"I believe everything happens for a reason," says Bosio, 30. "This game coming after the tragedies of the last month—well, my wife and I sat up the night of the no-hitter until about five in the morning. I said, 'Suzanne, what's going on here?' We both shrugged our shoulders and didn't say a word for about 15 minutes. Then we looked at each other and said, 'This is just unbelievable.' "

PHOTO

AP

After a stress-filled spring, the Mariner righthander welcomed the joy of a no-hitter.