This expression was a favorite of Dizzy Dean, and during my teenage years I was a regular viewer of the baseball “Game of the Week” with Mr. Dean as the color announcer. I wasn’t much of a baseball player but became a fan of the game because of his colorful descriptions. He used this expression to describe that there were runners on base and ready to score if the batter could get a hit or make a “productive out.” It was originally used by Arch McDonald, a broadcaster for the Washington Senators from 1934 to 1956. It did not refer to a hunter seeing ducks sitting on a pond and thinking of them as easy targets.