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Mendoza's Heroes
Mario Mendoza never appeared in an All-Star Game. He never played in a World Series. He never hit more than two home runs during a single season and he batted less than .200 five of his nine Major League seasons. His name will live on forever through the expression "Mendoza Line", but what do you really know about "Chihuahua"? Al Pepper in Mendoza's Heroes writes:
It's worth our time to get to know the man who owns the most famous line since Mason and Dixon. I vividly remember Mario Mendoza as a rookie with the Pittsburgh Pirates. As a person who grew up as an ardent fan of the Philadelphia Phillies throughout the '70s, the team I hated with all the hate in the world was the cross-state Pittsburgh Pirates. Not only were they a natural rival, they always seemed to take pleasure in drubbing the Phillies until the Phil's finally got good enough (read Steve Carlton and Mike Schmidt) to return the favor. My recollection of Mario Mendoza back then was that he was a wonderful defensive shortstop and (at least in the games I saw or heard him play) hit no better or worse than one of my idols, Phillies shortstop Larry Bowa.
Mario (Aizpuru) Mendoza was born in Chihuahua, Mexico on December 26, 1950. The unusually named city (translates as “dry and sandy place”) is about 250 miles south of El Paso and serves as the capital of the largest state in Mexico. Chihuahua was also the birthplace of all-time minor league home run king Hector Espino and renowned actor Anthony Quinn.
While it is an exaggeration to say Mario Mendoza was born with a fielder’s glove on his hand, he must have excelled as an infielder at a very tender age. Oscar Soria saw Mario play throughout his career. He recalls this inspirational story of Mario Mendoza’s origins in professional baseball:
A guy named Noga was the manager in Hermosillo. Mario was a rookie. He was trying to be the shortstop. Mr. Noga told Mario, “You have nothing to do in baseball; you are wasting your time.” So Noga sent Mario to the Navojoa Mayos. [It was with this team] where he started to show his potential in this business and started his great career.
Mario Mendoza impressed scouts with his superior range, sure hands, fluid motion, and strong, accurate throws to first. Signed as a 19-year-old free agent by the Pittsburgh Pirates, Mendoza quickly showed his defensive prowess. Brian Barsher, who was also a shortstop on the Pirates’ 1971 spring training roster, recalled that Mario Mendoza’s quickness in getting to the ball and quick release in his throw were convincing enough to make Barsher move to catcher.
One of Mendoza’s earliest influences was the legendary Roberto Clemente. He worked out with the great Pirate outfielder during spring training sessions 1971 and 1972. Mendoza and other Hispanic minor leaguers would listen to Clemente’s prophetic advice on overcoming the hardships of making it into the majors. So enthralled Clemente became when talking to the prospects, he would oftentimes miss dinner and continue his lectures through the evening. Mendoza and Clemente might have been teammates, had Clemente’s life not been tragically cut short following a December 31, 1972 plane crash while on a humanitarian mission.
Mario Mendoza progressed well on his way up to the majors. He led Carolina League shortstops with 79 double plays for Salem in 1972. His high-water mark with the bat came in 1973. While playing Double-A ball at Sherbrooke, Mendoza posted career bests with 8 home runs, a .268 batting average, and 30 stolen bases. He was also named all-star shortstop of the Eastern League.
He joined the Pirates early in the 1974 season and hit .221 for them in 91 games. The Pirates of '74 won the NL East and faced the Dodgers in the National League Championship Series (NLCS), losing 3-games-to-1. In his only post-season action, Mario Mendoza made it into three games and had one RBI single in five at bats. Now isn't that interesting; his lifetime post-season batting average is .200. That's truly smack-dab on the Mendoza Line. But in those playoffs, Mendoza fared better than the following Pirates who had at least 5 at bats: Ed Kirkpatrick (.000), Al Oliver (.143), Dave Parker (.125), Bob Robertson (.000) and Rennie Stennet (.063). Dodgers' ace Don Sutton, with a 0.53 ERA in 17 innings work, pretty much kept most of the Buccos in check..
Mario Mendoza played with Pittsburgh through 1978, mostly in a reserve role to Frank Taveras. A solid and versatile defenseman, Mendoza played second base and third base as well as shortstop. Along the way, there were some interesting moments. In 1976, he hit a final inning double to beat the Houston Astros. Once, in 1977, he even pitched a couple of innings for the Pirates, giving up 3 earned runs in the effort. But what might have been the clincher to forever stay away from the mound was when a line drive struck him on the belt buckle, nearly depantsing him in the process. Mario hit his first Major League home run in 1978 against the San Francisco Giants.
Traded to the Seattle Mariners in 1979, Mendoza finally found himself in a starter's role. He appeared in 148 games as the everyday shortstop and batted .198 that year. This ties him with Steve Jeltz for most games played in a season while batting below .200. He did have some highlights at the plate. His only home run of the year was an inside-the-park shot. Against the New York Yankees on July 11, Mario went 2-for-4 with two runs scored and three RBI in a 16-1 Mariners' rout. He even led the team in an offensive statistical category -- sacrifice bunts with 13.
Tom Paciorek, the alleged author of the Mendoza Line, stated that Mendoza was one of the Mariners’ most popular players and was something of a clubhouse wag. Mendoza’s favorite target was the grizzled veteran Willie Horton. Though in his late thirties, Horton played every game at DH for the 1979 Mariners and clouted 29 home run balls. Mendoza was forever giving Horton a hard time on everything from his age to never playing the field. According to Paciorek, Willie Horton used to always say to Mario Mendoza, “Get away from me, you crazy Mexican.” Paciorek, while sitting next to a sleeping Horton on a bus ride, claims that the slugger woke up screaming, “Get away from me, you crazy Mexican.”
You'll find sp much more amazing information in the book about Mario Mendoza, the Mendoza Line, and even more importantly, fifty former Major League players who hit below .200. Baseball Almanac loved Mendoza's Heroes and we honestly do believe you will too.
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"I remember going into a series in Seattle, think I went 2-for-12 with two home runs, but hit the ball on the nose like 10 times. It was one of those streaks. I remember Mario Mendoza, the shortstop for the Mariners, making two or three diving stabs up the middle. When that starts happening, you think, 'Geez, I wonder if it's in the stars.' You're hitting line drives right at someone and guys are diving for balls and catching them. You're like, 'What is going on here? A month ago that was a hit.' Now all of a sudden I can't buy a hit. Then you start trying a little too hard." - George Brett
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| Book Description (From The Publisher) |
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Baseball's honor rolls are filled with legendary deeds of batting prowess. Throughout history, crowds have risen in unison from their seats to loudly cheer the majestic trajectory of a white sphere "crushed" by the likes of Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, and Barry Bonds.
But, what about players like Bill Bergen, who hit an abysmal .170 in eleven seasons. Or Cramer Beard, one of the greatest minor league hitters of all time, but just a .198 hitter in the majors. How about Marty Castillo? He of a .190 batting average and nine big league home runs; however, one of those homers helped win a game in the 1984 World Series.
These men also have surprising stories. Virginia-based baseball author Al Pepper reveals theirs and 47 other's unique, offbeat, and unusual tales in Mendoza's Heroes: Fifty Batters Below .200.
You may be familiar with Brian Doyle, Herman Franks, Choo Choo Coleman, and Bob Uecker. Others, forgotten in the mists of time, are brought back to life. Using eye-opening statistics, interviews with players, and anecdotal biographies, Pepper's Mendoza's Heroes serves as a rollicking tour through baseball history ? from baseball's ancient and chaotic nineteenth century through today.
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| Editorial Reviews |
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Amazon: "Numerous books have been written about baseball's champion batsmen. But, what about ballplayers who repeatedly produced little more than pathetic squibbers to third base, infield pop ups, and ego bruising strikeouts? What could possibly be their value to a baseball club? Plenty. Using eye-opening statistics, interviews with players, and illustrations, author Al Pepper produces remarkable biographies of fifty of major league baseball's worst hitters. Men like Brian Doyle, Choo Choo Coleman, Bob Uecker, Tony La Russa, Ted Beard, Charlie Manual, and 44 others finally receive their due. The origins of the famous Mendoza Line and a biography of its namesake Mario Mendoza is also included. In addition, the book serves as a rollicking tour through baseball history - from the nineteenth century through today. Foreword by ex-big leaguer Mike Stenhouse."
Baseball Almanac: "A truly creative approach to a rarely researched topic makes Mendoza's Heroes one of favorite books in years. They might not all be true heroes, but they did make it to the Major League level and author Al Pepper pays each of them justice in this informative / well researched book. Thank you Al for remembering some of the 'other' players and we honestly do look forward to your next book."
Legends of Sports Newsletter: "Fascinating biographies from baseball's fringe."
Notes from the Shadows of Cooperstown: "The research makes the book worth the look."
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| Excerpt from Mendoza's Heroes |
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"The Curious Origins of the Mendoza Line"
According to The New Dickson Baseball Dictionary, the following is the definition of the term "Mendoza line:"
Mendoza line. 1. The figurative boundary in the batting averages between those batters hitting above and below .215. It is named for shortstop Mario Mendoza whose career (1974-1982) batting average for the Pirates, Mariners and Rangers was .215.
2. The figurative boundary in the batting averages between those batters hitting above and below .200. "When a struggling hitter pulls his average above .200, he has crossed the Mendoza Line." (Sports Illustrated, Sept. 13, 1982.) Jim Henneman (Baltimore Sun, June 7, 1994) wrote of Brady Anderson: "A few years ago, when he was struggling to stay above the Mendoza (.200) line, Anderson commanded the same strategy."
ETY Coinage of the term has been credited to George Brett, who has quoted: "The first thing I look for in the Sunday papers is who is below the Mendoza line" (Glen Waggoner & Robert Sklars, Rotisserie League Baseball, 1987. But according to Sports Illustrated (Aug. 20, 1990), the term was coined by Tom Paciorek or Bruce Bochte; broadcaster Mel Proctor (Home Team Sports telecast, Apr. 25, 1996) said Mendoza, while playing for Seattle (1979- 80) was hitting above and below .200 and that teammates Paciorek & Bochte commented on that fact in the interview, and later Brett picked up on it and used the term.
Usage Note. This clearly emerging term can have two slightly different meanings (.215 vs. .200), so it is important to make sure which Mendoza line is being referred to. However, it seems like the .200 line is used much more commonly than the .215 version.
For all practical purposes, definition 2 (the .200 version) is the only one I have seen used in context. In this work, any reference to "Mendoza Line" is also ensconced in the .200 standard.
The first time I heard the term was early in the 1988 season. Naturally, it was ESPN Sportscenter host and legendary sobriquet-fabricator Chris Berman, who uttered the words during a Sportcenter broadcast. He was using it in reference to a prominent slugger (don't ask me who), whom was struggling in the early season. From then on, not only have I heard the term used often in the sport of baseball, it has transcended into other disciplines as well.
Even before Mario Mendoza ever played, there were other terms used for a less-than-stellar hitter. In the 19th century, you could be a "tapperitis hitter" or one who hits tappers. "Can't hit a balloon" and "Can't hit a bull in the ass with a shovel" go back to the beginning of the century. There's "buttercup hitter," first used in the '30s. To not "hit one's weight" is another. You could "have a hole in your bat," be an "out man" or be a "10 o'clock hitter," meaning you hit the ball hard during morning batting practice but do little during the game. "Banjo hitter," "ukulele hitter" and "Punch and Judy hitter" all describe light hitters; however, not necessarily a totally inept batter as it has the connotation of someone who can scratch-out cheap singles. Of more recent vintage, a batter "on the Interstate" would mean that his .180 batting average would look like "I80" on old-fashioned scoreboards lights.
There were even a few precursors to the Mendoza line. The Giants of the late 1960s had the "Lanier-Mason Line", a play on Mason-Dixon Line, which suggested you were hitting in the range between Don Mason (.205 career batting average) and Hal Lanier (.228 career batting average). The Tigers had the "Ray Oyler Divide." Most likely, every Major League team had some sort of less-than-complimentary term for lackluster hitting, named after some obscure player, which came and went. But in just a span of 20 years, the Mendoza line has become so mainstream, it will most likely live as long as baseball.
Many theories abound on who first described the mythical line that separates decent hitters from marginal hitters. Pirates' fans claim legendary announcer Bob Prince came up with the term while Mario Mendoza was batting .140 one year; I doubt it. Another source credits Johnny Bench. There is even a minority, insisting that Christobal (Minnie) Mendoza is the actual Mendoza referred to in "Mendoza line." Minnie Mendoza, a consistent .300 hitter in the minor leagues during the '60s, finally made it with the Minnesota Twins in 1970. At age 36, Minnie hit .188 in 16 games with the Twins that year. Though Minnie Mendoza truly hit below .200 for his brief Major League career, no documented evidence supports the claim of anyone using the term "Mendoza line" in the '60s and early '70s.
Most credit coinage of the term to George Brett, who originally quoted in 1980: ?The first thing I look for in the Sunday papers is who is below the Mendoza line.? However, according to Sports Illustrated (Aug. 20, 1990), Mendoza?s teammates on the Seattle Mariners, Tom Paciorek and/or Bruce Bochte, are the originators. Mendoza told SI that Paciorek invented the term. But Paciorek insisted otherwise, ?It wasn?t my idea. It was Bruce Bochte?s. I got the credit, but I don?t want it.?
There was some credence to Brett being the originator. As far back as I can remember, every Sunday paper in the country presents the Major League batting and pitching statistics, as compiled by the Elias Sports Bureau. The format separately lists National League and American League batters in order from highest to lowest BA. Not every active player makes this list. To appear, a player must have a minimum number of plate appearances (different from an at bat) each week, based on the product of games played as of the previous Friday, multiplied by the constant 3.1. Since Mario was primarily a reserve with the Pittsburgh Pirates, he never would have appeared in this feature since he never had the requisite number of plate appearances.
However, while playing in the American League, Mario, at least for a while, was a regular and would have appeared in the Sunday tabulations for a good part of the 1979 through 1981 seasons. Since George Brett was a contemporary of Mario during Mendoza's AL days, it is conceivable that Brett would thumb through the Sunday edition of the Kansas City Star, checking to see which rivals had a lower batting average than Mario Mendoza. Most likely, this would have happened in 1979, since that was the only year that Mendoza's batting average truly hovered around the .200 range.
You know what's interesting about all this? No one questions the greatness of George Brett. He is, in my assessment, one of the 50 greatest ballplayers ever. How can anyone argue his credentials: a first ballot Hall of Fame selectee, member of the 3000-hit club, only man to win batting titles in three different decades and the closest approach to the holy grail of a .400 season in the last half-century. Yet, he is probably best remembered for three things:
1. Suffering hemorrhoids during the 1980 post-season (even my Anatomy professor at Temple University, who knew little about baseball, cited Brett when discussing the anatomy of the rectum);
2. The "Pine Tar Incident," which ranks as one of the most controversial calls in sports history; and, of course
3. The Mendoza Line.
Mexican sportscaster Oscar Soria corroborates the SI story. The voice of the Mexican League?s Hermosillo Naranjeros, Soria provided these comments concerning the Mendoza Line:
"I know Mario because he is the manager of the Obregon Yaquis in the Mexican Pacific League. I am a sportscaster in this league, I do the play-by-play of the Hermosillo team on TV, and that?s the reason I know Mario very well. In an interview a few weeks ago, I asked Mario about the Mendoza line and he said that Tom Paciorek was the first to mention the phrase ?Mendoza Line? when he read the Sunday paper. Then George Brett heard about that and, years after that, Chris Berman quoted about the Mendoza line. Mario said that when Chris Berman mentioned it and people started to laugh, he was angry, but now he enjoys the fame of the phrase Mendoza line.
Based on the statements of Soria and the Sports Illustrated article, we all can be fairly certain that the originator of the ?Mendoza Line? were his own teammates and not an outsider like Brett.
How did the term, Mendoza line, become a piece of modern-day American jargon? The answer is intuitively simple: ESPN. The all-sports television network began its emergence right at the tail-end of Mario Mendoza's playing days. Without sounding too much like a sociologist, such a cultural influence ESPN Sportscenter has become, not only has it injected many new buzzwords and catch phrases into our everyday speech, it has even changed the way professional athletes play the game. Look at NBA basketball. The slam-dunk and the long 3-point shot are the only things you see highlighted on Sportscenter and its spawn. Basketball players, knowing the value in frequency of highlight file during contract negotiations, emphasize the perfection of these "circus shots" at the expense of say a 12-foot jump shot. This may explain why few players can hit a mid-range jump shot anymore and NBA teams seldom break 100 points scored in a game anymore.
It's not much different in baseball. The only things you see highlighted anymore are the home run, the strikeout and the bench clearing brawl after a hit batsman. Experts attribute the spike in recent home run hitting, in part, to the modern-day player's mentality of getting a few seconds of evening highlight film ? even at the expense of striking out more.
With such a cultural stranglehold on the American male population, it stands to reason that terms like, "Cooler than the other side of the pillow," "back..back...back..back...back" and "He's gone below the Mendoza line" take on lives of their own after you hear them day after day from Chris Berman et. al.
Another reason for the popularity of "Mendoza line," is that it just plain sounds pleasing to the ear. Spanish is a pretty sounding language, especially those rich, rolling Z's. Men-doh-zzzzahhhh! For Americans, always looking for something cool and hip to say, "Mendoza line" is a sure-fire. Use it in a sentence and you're batting 1.000 in hipness!
Copyright © 2002 Al Pepper
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Baseball Book Shelf: Mendoza's Heroes : Fifty Batters Below .200
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How did Al Pepper come up with the fifty players in Mendoza's Heroes? Darts? SWAG? Bribes? In actuality, he devised a fairly involved process called "Mendoza's Algorithm" & employed the following seven rules (not found in the book & courtesy of the author):
RULE 1: KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid). Make the math easy enough for your 11-year old son to understand. And I am assuming your 11-year old son is a relatively bright young lad. Also, make the baseball terminology simple enough for your wife to comprehend.
RULE 2: Remember the Post-season. Every statistical analysis I have seen looks solely at regular season statistics. None consider World Series or League Championship Series appearances and performance. While Ernie Banks may not appreciate this, you have to make some inference that the great players, and even career .190 players, must be credited for doing things to help get their teams into championship situations.
RULE 3: Respect Great Performance Over Different Spans of a Player's Career. Some assessments are totally fixated over the long haul of a player's career, from first at-bat to last game some twenty years hence. Others focus on peak performance over the span of their best seasons. As you read on, you will see that I award players for performance over the course of a career, over the course of a season and even within the fleeting few hours over the course of a single game. In the end, I weighted the assessment to assign more merit to career statistics.
RULE 4: Honor defense. It's easy to focus entirely on batting. However, based on my painful experiences in slow-pitch softball, while suffering through half-innings in right field that seemed to last for an eternity, I made a simple observation. If you cannot defend, your team will lose badly every time. In Major League ball, it is usually a given that players catch and throw the ball quite well. However, some players have made glovework such a weapon, that they provide substantial value added to their team's bottom line. This factor becomes even more significant when dealing with my population of players, whose glove may have been more valuable than their bat. As any assessor of baseball talent will tell you, quantifying that over nine different positions and a multitude of factors is not easy. I'll give it my best try.
RULE 5: Define a standard unit for baseball excellence. Physicists measure energy in joules. Chemists measure heat in calories. I measure baseball prowess in "jeltzs." What's a jeltz? I could have referred it as anything, even something mundane, like a point. However, for no better reason, I named it after Steve Jeltz. Jeltz was a slick fielding, albeit light hitting (.219 career batting average), infielder for the Philadelphia Phillies through the late '80s. The only reason for naming it a jeltz is the fact a teammate of mine once nicknamed me "Jeltzie" while I was playing Socko (a variant of softball where teams pitch to their own batters) back in 1988. Since it was the only time anybody ever linked my ability with that of a Major Leaguer, it was something of significance. That Steve Jeltz batted .189 that year, while I was not batting that much higher for my Socko team, made the significance quite obvious.
RULE 6: Determine the most meaningful statistics and weight them as such. You will soon receive an introduction to a plethora of batting and fielding statistics. They are mostly what sabermetricians refer to as classical in nature. Classical statistics are the same statistics your father and even your grandfather are familiar with when they were kids. They include simple counting statistics like Runs Batted In (RBI and not RBIs since the plural is contained within the acronym) and the use of simple division to obtain decimal ratios such as Batting Average and Slugging Average. In a few instances, I elect to use potentially more powerful, yet esoteric, statistics which I will explain in detail.
One thing I will employ is the categorizing of batting statistics into two distinct groups: Grande (French for big) statistics and petite (French for little) statistics. Grande statistics are loosely defined as those statistics that are either so universally recognized by fans that they must be included or those I felt were prominent in defining offensive run contribution amongst players. The following is a list of the Grande statistics:
HOME RUNS (HR);
RUNS BATTED IN (RBI);
BATTING AVERAGE (BA);
TOTAL AVERAGE (TA) [in lieu of career BA]; and
RUNS SCORED (R).
While three of the five Grande stats are your three basic Triple Crown jewels, I also respect the importance of runs scored. Most sabermetric studies simply treat this as a by-product of effective hitting. But I look at it this way, the crossing the plate is tantamount to scoring a goal in basketball or hockey. And the RBI is basically an assist. We need to give as much credit to the goal as we do to the assist. With respect to Total Average, allow me to defer that until later. Any other batting statistics discussed will be treated as petite statistics. In essence, I award twice as many jeltzs for single season and career leaders of Grande statistics than petite statistics.
RULE 7: Measure the unmeasurable. When dealing with my unique group of players, many intangible factors may be the difference in extracting the inherent greatness and claims to fame that a player may have earned, which simply won't out in a table of traditional statistics. I cite a few examples:
Exceptional performance in professional ball outside the Major Leagues, such as minor league and Japanese League play.
An extraordinary performance in a game such as a game-winning pinch-hit home run or an unassisted triple play.
Effective batting performance as evidenced through more complex sabermetrics.
Contributions to the game such as coaching, managing and announcing.
Significant factors not necessary linked to their play, like having a famous sibling or achieving fame in another endeavor. Football's George Halas is my classic example. Before becoming "Papa Bear," he batted .091 in 12 games for the New York Highlanders.
Jeltz's are awarded for these intangibles in batting, fielding and a catch-all "other intangibles" category.
Each of the following former Major League ballplayers hit below .200 during their careers and they are featured inside of Mendoza's Heroes:
The author (Al Pepper) was born June 25, 1959 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania? He graduated from Temple University, went to the Naval Graduate School, and works as a program manager for communications testing.
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