Randy Jones, the sinker-throwing southpaw who was the Padres\u2019 first ever Cy Young winner and who finished his career with the Mets, died Tuesday, the Padres announced.<\/p>\n
He was 75. A cause of death was not disclosed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith deep sorrow and heavy hearts, the Padres mourn the passing of our beloved left-hander, Randy Jones,\u201d the Padres said in a statement Wednesday. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a giant in our lives and our franchise history.\u201d<\/p>\n
Randy Jones, the Padres\u2019 first Cy Young winner, died Tuesday at the age of 75. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Randy Jones with the Mets before a game in San Diego in May 1981. Diamond Images\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
An Orange County, Calif. native, Jones was drafted by the Padres in the fifth round in 1972 out of Chapman University.<\/p>\n
He impressed as a rookie in 1973, pitching to a 3.16 ERA in 20 games (19 starts) before losing 22 games in 1974 as the Padres lost 102 games for the second straight season.<\/p>\n
But the ground-ball specialist became one of the top pitchers in baseball in \u201975, posting the best season of his career with a 20-12 record, 2.24 ERA and 1.05 WHIP in 285 innings. He finished second in the NL Cy Young voting that year to Mets legend Tom Seaver.<\/p>\n
Jones captured the Cy Young the following season, going 22-14 with a 2.74 ERA and 1.03 WHIP in 315 \u2153 innings \u2014 while recording just 93 strikeouts and earning his second straight All-Star nod.<\/p>\n
Over Jones\u2019 eight seasons with the Padres \u2014 who retired his No. 35 in 1997 \u2014 he recorded a 3.30 ERA.<\/p>\n
Randy Jones tips his hat to the crowd during the MLB All-Star Game in San Diego on July 12, 2016. Getty Images<\/p>\n
He was traded to the Mets after the 1980 season and struggled with the Amazin\u2019s over his final two MLB seasons, with a 4.69 ERA over a combined 41 appearances (32 starts.)<\/p>\n
Jones later gave pitching lessons to future lefty Cy Young winner Barry Zito for five years, beginning when Zito was age 12.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Randy Jones, the sinker-throwing southpaw who was the Padres\u2019 first ever Cy Young winner and who finished his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":439562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2396],"tags":[5,101,4,1690,61,2548,4203,6423,18,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-439561","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-mets","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mets","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-mets","13":"tag-newyork","14":"tag-newyorkmets","15":"tag-obituaries","16":"tag-san-diego-padres","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115577357892820486","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=439561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/439561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/439562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=439561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=439561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=439561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}