Randy Johnson will be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame this weekend. He won’t, in all likelihood, make the PETA Hall of Fame.
The Big Unit — who will join Pedro Martinez, John Smoltz and Craig Biggio in this year’s Hall of Fame class — had plenty of memorable moments throughout his dominant career. Yet despite all his accomplishments, there’s still one incident he’ll never live down.
On March 24, 2001, Johnson was on the mound during a spring training game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and San Francisco Giants when he delivered a fastball toward home plate in the seventh inning.
But that fastball never reached its intended target, somehow hitting a bird mid-flight and killing the poor thing on impact.
The freak accident didn’t win Johnson many fans in the animal rights community, but the towering lefty didn’t let it bother him — in fact, he later paid homage to the bizarre moment by making it his logo for his photography company.
[tweet https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/552504508295962627 align=’center’]
It’s good to see Johnson embracing the event, because whether he likes it or not, this instance of fowl play will stick with him forever.
