Johnson joins exclusive club with win No. 300
When Randy Johnson recorded his 300th career victory on June 4, 2009, it marked the fourth time inside of six years that a pitcher had reached the milestone.
It could very well have been the last.
On a rainy day at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., Johnson started the first game of a traditional doubleheader for the San Francisco Giants. The game was postponed from the previous day, pushing back Johnson’s attempt at win No. 300 by about 24 hours. He had reached 299 in his last start on May 27.
“This is a long-term thing that has been going on for 21 years,” Johnson told the San Jose Mercury News about becoming the 24th pitcher to record 300 wins. “You finally get to this day and you know if the team plays well, and you pitch well, something can happen that’s only happened 24 times.”
An announced crowd of 16,787 likely featured no more than a couple thousand people in the seats in a game the Giants won 5-1. San Francisco would score all the runs Johnson would need in the top of the second inning on a Juan Uribe groundout that plated Fred Lewis and an Emmanuel Burriss single that scored Travis Ishikawa. Johnson, meanwhile, was perfect through 10 batters before allowing a one-out walk to Nick Johnson in the fourth inning. The Nationals scored an unearned run in the sixth when Johnson doubled home Alberto González – who had reached on an error – but Johnson escaped without further damage.
During the at-bat prior to Gonzalez reaching base, however, Johnson fielded a grounder by Anderson Hernández and tumbled to the ground as he threw to first base. Johnson landed on his left shoulder, which stiffened up – leading Giants manager Bruce Bochy to decide to remove Johnson from the game after the sixth inning.
Johnson allowed two hits and two walks while striking out two batters. Brandon Medders, Jeremy Affeldt and Brian Wilson preserved the Giants’ 2-1 lead through the eighth inning – Wilson fanned Adam Dunn with the bases loaded to end the eighth – and San Francisco put the game out of reach with three runs in the ninth.
Wilson struck out the side in the bottom of the ninth to preserve Johnson’s historic victory.
“By (the bottom of the eighth), Randy was sitting next to me,” Bochy told the Mercury News. “I told him: ‘You know, we don’t do anything easy here.’”
At 45 years old, Johnson became the second-oldest pitcher to reach the mark behind Phil Niekro, who was 46 when he won his 300th game in 1985. Johnson became the first pitcher to record win No. 300 in a Giants uniform since Christy Mathewson on July 5, 1912.
Since Johnson recorded No. 300, no pitcher has come within striking distance of joining the list. He retired following the 2009 season and was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility in 2015.
“It sounds funny, but you know, I’ve played 22 years, I’m 45, and I’ve come upon 300 wins and I’m thinking: ‘I only have 211 more to catch Cy Young,’” Johnson told the Mercury News. “I’ve really started thinking about that stuff. It really puts things in perspective.”
Craig Muder is the director of communications for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum
