This Week in Phillies History: Randy Ready was ready

After a week last week in which there wasn’t a whole lot to get excited about, This Week in Phillies History provided us with a number of great events to look back on with awe and wonder.

Lefty recorded his 3,000th strikeout back in 1981 against the Montreal Expos, as noted by the Phillies on Twitter Thursday.

Tim Wallach was his 3,000th victim, and Wallach was prominent in another great moment in Phils history as well. If you know what it is, let us know in the comments section below!

Also, on April 28, 2010, Ruben Amaro Jr. signed Ryan Howard to his five-year, $125 million contract extension, an unwise move that ultimately didn’t really prevent the Phils from doing anything they wanted or needed to do, money-wise. In ‘93, the Phils finished the month of April with a 17-5 record after beating the Dodgers in Los Angeles 7-6, and former Phillie Joe Cowley in ‘87 pitched his final game for the Phils, as well as the final game of his big league career, becoming the only pitcher in baseball history not to win another game after throwing a no-hitter (which he did with the White Sox in 1986).

But the moment of honor this week goes to former Phillies utility infielder Randy Ready, owner of the best mullet of the early ‘90s (and there were many). It was even better than Dave Hollins’, and that’s saying something.

Ready pulled off the first triple play at Veterans Stadium against the San Diego Padres, with runners on 1st and 2nd and the great Tony Gwynn at the plate.

Now this moment could have been even greater if Ready had the presence of mind to tag the runner who was approaching second base, instead of throwing to Ricky Jordan at first. Had he done that, he would have had an unassisted triple play, much like Eric Bruntlett pulled off against the Mets in 2009. Only 15 times in baseball history has a player pulled off the unassisted triple play, and a line drive to the second baseman or shortstop with the runners moving is really the only way you can pull that off.

But, let’s not minimize Ready’s heads-up play, and the fact that the guy was here for five very lean years, two different stints. He came to Philadelphia midway through the 1989 season in the deal that brought John Kruk to the Phils from San Diego. He stayed with the Phils through the ‘91 season and had an .837 OPS in 72 games immediately following the trade. From 1990-91 his OPS dropped to .674 and was gone for the ‘92 and ‘93 seasons, only to return in 1994 and ‘95, but only played in 40 combined games in those two seasons.

Randy Ready. He was always ready.

You can hear audio clips from all of this week’s great moments on the latest episode of Hittin’ Season, No. 379, right here!