Randy Johnson Retires
After 22 seasons in Major League Baseball, “the big unit” Randy Johnson has decided to hang up his cleats and call it a career. Randy Johnson has done a lot of great things his career but the one thing I will remember him for is being apart of the greatest 1-2 punch in pitching history with Curt Schilling when they played together with the Arizona Diamondbacks. They won a World Series in 2001 by defeating the Yankees. Randy Johnson spent time with six teams which started with the Montreal Expos (1988–1989), Seattle Mariners (1989–1998), Houston Astros (1998), Arizona Diamondbacks (1999–2004), New York Yankees (2005–2006), back to the Arizona Diamondbacks (2007–2008), and San Francisco Giants (2009). He had an impact for each team he played for. His career accomplishments are right about there with the best of them. His accomplishments include the following:
-World Series champion (2001)
-1995 AL Cy Young Award
-Four time NL Cy Young Award winner (1999, 2000, 2001, 2002)
-2001 World Series MVP
-Pitched a perfect game on May 18, 2004
-Ten time All-Star selection (1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004)
-2001 Babe Ruth Award
The most talked about Randy Johnson moment isn’t even the no hitter. People still talked about his fastball that killed a bird during a game. It’s on every sports highlight reel show and even sports scientists tried to recreate it but they can’t. It was a one in million chance that it would happen. For me personally I will always remember Randy Johnson as a Seattle Mariner, and Arizona Diamondback. He played with a lot of great players between those two teams and thats when he was his most dominant.
There is no doubt in my mind that Randy Johnson is a first ballot Hall of Famer. He has earned it and has the stats to back it up. He left the league with 303 wins, a 3.29 era, and 100 complete games. He also struck out 4875 people which is a lot of people. Randy Johnson has been a lot of fun to watch and has had some memorable pitching performances. Congratulations Randy on your career and all your accomplishments. There will never be another Big Unit.
He'll probably go into the hall wearing a D-Backs cap, because he actually played 6 seasons there (compared to 7 or 8 with the M's) and won 4 Cy Youngs in a row and a championship. Not to mention Arizona is where his career absolutely blew up (he had great seasons in Seattle, but it wasn't close to what he did in the desert).
It's odd to say (because it's the present and we all got to watch him) but Randy Johnson is probably the greatest left handed starting pitcher to ever play the game. Think about that for a second.
I wonder if "The Big Unit" was ever on "the juice".. How come no one ever asks that?? No one that dominating at any position in any sport should be considered "clean" without any discussion. Just look at A-Rod, Tiger, Clemons… The list goes on. Johnson has to be questioned too…..
Well Fish we will never know if we on the "juice" because he never grew in muscle or body mass. He never did anything suspicious or lived a suspicious life. So I will say you are you wrong on that one buddy.