Johan Santana tossed the first and only no-hitter in New York Mets history on June 1, 2012, but the outing came at a cost.

Santana threw 134 pitches that night and the left-hander hasn't pitched in the Major Leagues since that season. He's had multiple procedures as he attempts to make a comeback.

"You can't say it was the right decision or the wrong decision," Santana says of his pitch count. "Because you don't know. No doctor ever told me, 'Oh, if you didn't throw so many pitches in this game or that game, your shoulder would not have been hurt again.' Maybe if I would have gotten knocked out in the fourth inning, everything would have been different, or nothing would have been different."

While the root of the problem is tough to pinpoint, Santana struggled in his next start after the no-hitter. He was battered by the New York Yankees, giving up four home runs in five innings. After that came another five-inning start in which he surrendered four runs and labored through 96 pitches. Santana then had a stretch of several decent outings, but only got past the sixth inning once the rest of the season.

"It's easy to criticize things after they happened," Santana says. "You don't have a crystal ball to say what's going to happen. I told Terry [Collins] I felt fine, and I did. Even if an army had come to get me, I wouldn't have come out of the game. I love this game too much."