There were two perfect games during the official Showdown era, and while David Cone's accomplishment earned him a place of honor in the original starter set, Randy Johnson's wasn't quite as easy to get in the 2005 Showdown collection.
Johnson had a typical Johnson season in 2004, leading the majors with 290 Strikeouts and nabbing his 10th all star nomination, but something atypical was on May 18th when he rolled up to Turner Field to face the Atlanta Braves and pitched a perfect game where he struck out 13 men, the 2nd most total at the time for a perfect game and just one short of Sandy Koufax's masterpiece. Typical of the Diamondbacks of that time, they gave him minimal run support in the 2-0 win, but perfection never requires much.
At 40 years old, Johnson became the oldest perfect game pitcher in history, displacing the legendary Cy Young from the mark. It was also the 1st no hitter in Diamondbacks history, a great accomplishment for Johnson along with his 1990 no hitter, which was the 1st in Seattle Mariners history. For a man like Randy Johnson, such a set of accomplishments are just footnotes to his Hall of Fame resume.
Johnson was obviously part of the 2005 MLB Showdown set, so enjoy this special Pennant Run variant. Don't confuse it with his Trading Deadline card in the official set to show his switch to the Yankees for the following season.
Hammock was not in the official set, and just in his 2nd season in baseball, but Johnson couldn't stop singing his praises for how well he called the perfecto behind the plate.
Besides Hammock, Kata was the only other Arizona Diamondback in that game to not be included in the 2005 Showdown set. He and his +4 at 2nd Base helped Johnson keep the Braves off the bases.
Hampton has some very notable Showdown cards in his time, but had nothing to show for the 2005 set. Fortunately, we can highlight him as the opposing pitcher to Johnson to correct that unfortunate oversight. He held out on the mound for almost the entire game, just allowing the 2 runs, and only leaving the game for a pinch hitter with 2 outs in the 9th.
The Braves had very little hope against Johnson, but they had a former 5x Silver Slugger that day batting 9th. Hampton was far from your typical pitcher at the plate, and he came the closest to breaking up the perfect game in the 6th inning when he hit a slow chopper towards Shortstop where Alex Cintron had to make a quick nap and throw to 1st Base to barely retire the sprinting Hampton.
The last hope for the Braves was Showdown original Eddie Perez. Not apart of the official set, I feel that all the 2000 originals should be represented in every set, but that's me.
Every player from the game not apart of the 2005 Showdown set have been mentioned (plus the man of the hour getting his extra card) so let's flesh this story out with the 1990 Randy Johnson from the year the Big Unit nabbed his 1st career no hitter.
