If you're a young pitcher looking for a baseball career to emulate, Randy Johnson's would have to rank at the top of the list.
A slam-dunk first-ballot Hall of Famer and four-time Cy Young Award winner, Johnson won 303 major league games and ranks second on the all-time strikeout list with 4,785. His career spanned 22 seasons, five presidential administrations, and he arguably had two Hall of Fame careers -- one in the American League, one in the National League.
Johnson's stuff was legendary, but his superpower was his longevity -- which was made all the more impressive by his 6-foot-10 stature. What was his secret to staying healthy for so many seasons?
"All anybody can really say is, you gotta work hard," Johnson told Baseball Now as part of Budweiser’s 150th anniversary celebration ahead of Opening Day. "Keep your mind right, and you know, you can't predict career-ending injuries. You can't predict (if) someone's going to have the desire to play longer when they could retire if they want, but they would choose to play longer.
"There's no looking in a crystal ball to say what kind of career you're going to have or how long it's going to be. You have to do the things every day that will hopefully ensure you get through that day. And then when you get through today, then it's, you know, hit the repeat button. Then you gotta do that again."
Johnson won all four of his Cy Young Awards between ages 30 and 39, and put up a remarkable 68.6 bWAR in that decade of play. But he also finished second in Cy Young voting in his age 40 season, and even if the results started to tail off from there, Johnson made 30-plus starts three times from ages 41 to 44, including back-to-back seasons over 200 innings.
"I was just as proud of those moments to get through those years because I was older and didn't have youth and, you know, all the same tools as I got older," Johnson said. "So it was much more of a challenge and at times more rewarding."
In the years since Johnson, dozens of pitchers have come into the league and put up high-octane seasons that invoked memories of "The Big Unit." But none are likely to approach his innings and strikeout totals again, and the hardest throwers are often the ones who struggle with injuries the most.
So, regardless if you're reading this as a current big-leaguer or someone aspiring to be in Johnson's shoes one day, you might want to listen to Johnson on that "Persistence + Desire" math formula.
Johnson spoke with Baseball Now as part of Budweiser's 150th anniversary, where they announced the Bud 150 Club as well as MLB team cans with vintage-inspired designs. Bud Club 150 benefits include a pre-loaded Mastercard stocked with beer money as well as a chance to score tickets to MLB's biggest events, such as the All-Star Game, MLB Field of Dreams and the World Series. Legends Ken Griffey Jr., and Mike Piazza also joined the Budweiser campaign as new player partners.