Countdown to Spring Training

Welcome to the hardest-working Blog covering the Florida
Marlins. New to the business of Major League Blogging, Fish Baits
will be an excellent site for fans to get an opinionated view of the Marlins
Front Office.

Throughout the summer, Fish Baits will be providing you with a year-by-year
recap of the most unique franchise in the big leagues.

Soooooooooooo…. let’s begin my countdown at number 17. And what an easy and uncontroversial season to pick: 52 games behind first place. Winners of 10 games in a month just twice and playing 56 games under .500.

When the topic of worst
baseball teams ever came up. Of course the obligatory ’62 Mets and ’03 Tigers
come up, as it should.

The 1962 New York Mets were an expansion team that brought baseball back to America’s
largest city after the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants left for the West

Coast in 1957.  In 1962 the Mets failed to have a player drive in 100 runs (The two
franchises that left New York
had the top two leaders in RBI that year), batted .240 as a team, and lost 120
games (the single most loses in MLB History).

The 2003 Tigers didn’t have much to brag about. The Mets had to choose from a
list of castoffs to start their franchise, the ’03 Tigers dug themselves into a
43-119 season. Starting Pitcher Mike Maroth lost 21 games while teammate Jeremy
Bonderman missed the mark with 19 losses. Most college graduates (including
myself) weren’t even alive the last time a major league pitcher lost 20
games in a season, when Brian Kingman lost that many in 32 starts for the A’s
in 1980. It was a common occurrence during an era when starting pitchers closed
games (The Tigers had just 3 complete games during their unremarkable 2003 tear; which is unfathomable. To put it in perspective Walter
Johnson completed 531 starts; In 1904 Jack Taylor completed 39 consecutive
starts, yet the Tigers had 3). Back to my point, many pitchers lost 20 games in season.

1950s 11 1960s 16, 1970s 14, 1980s  1, but 1990s  0 and 2000s 1

So Maroth did something no pitcher had done in 23 years. Impressive.

Back to the All-time worst. If you look at worst winning percentage, the 1899 Cleveland 
Spiders take the cake with a 20-134 record (.130 percentage), 1916 Philadelphia A's 
(36-117 .235 percentage), and the 1935 Boston Braves (38-115 .248) all have a worse 
winning percentage than both the Mets and Tigers. 

Ok so now you're saying, "Where the hell is this kid going with this." Well....it's a perfect
segway to describe the 1998 Florida Marlins team that won just 12 more games than the
all-time worst. To add insult to injury, the Marlins won the World Series months before 
the '98 team tried to defend the crown. Laughable.

14 of the 25 1997 team were traded in what had to be the largest fire sale of a World 
Series winner in baseball history. Left field would no longer be manned by Moises Alou 
who drove in 115 runs...his replacement? A 25 year old Cliff Floyd, who at the time,
never hit more than 6 home runs in a season despite a 16 year career of 233 homeruns.  
Greg Zaun took over for one of the greatest defensive catchers in Charles Johnson. Devon
White and Gary Sheffield had a combined 24 years of major league experience by 

1998...and they were replaced by Todd Dunwoody and Mark Kotsay, who weren't even 
on Earth for 24 years. 

Needless to say it was a sad off-season for Marlin fans. The highest of highs turned into the 
lowest of lows. The 1998 squad fielded future All-Stars Derek Lee, Edgar Renteria, Cliff 
Floyd, Luis Castillo, Alex Gonzalez, Preston Wilson, Ryan Dempster and Livan Hernandez.

Hernandez and Brian Meadows combined for 40 percent of the 54 wins. The runner up for
Rookie of the Year in 1997 went 10-12 the following season, while Meadows had his 
career mark of 11 wins in a season. Outside of that, names like Donn Pall, Andy Larkin, 
Rafael Medina, Eric Ludwick and Gabe Gonzalez will make you scratch your head. The 
Marlins bullpen combined for just 24 saves that year. An ex-Marlin (Trevor Hoffman) led 
the league with 53 saves BY HIMSELF.  

The '98 Marlins had two players with more strikeouts than hits. Three players with over 
100 strikeouts, no one drove in 100 runs, and no one watched it. Why? Because ticket 
prices increased 12%. What a year!

But the lasting legacy of the worst season in franchise year will be the opportunity to acquire
pivotal players such as Derek Lee, AJ Burnett, Preston Wilson, and Mike Lowell. Heck,
we even housed a future Hall of Famer (Mike Piazza) for five games; although he never hit a
home run during his stint.  

Compare the '98 squad to the '03 Tigers with a 20 game loser, the '62 Mets with 120 
losses, or the 1899 Spiders (if given 100 games would win 13) and realize they were in the
neighborhood but weren't the kings. However, the pain and agony of dismantling the 
champs will always live in the hearts and minds of South Floridians and some have never 
been back.