In 1983, budding superstar for the Baltimore Orioles, shortstop Cal Ripken Jr., in just his 2nd full season in the Majors, won the American League MVP award. The year prior, he was named the AL Rookie of the Year in a near-unanimous decision, earning 94% of the votes. It was in May of that freshman campaign when ‘Rip’ kicked off his historic consecutive game streak. After sitting out the 2nd game of a doubleheader against the Toronto Blue Jays on May 29th, Ripken was back in the lineup the following day. From a performance perspective, Ripken’s game itself was uneventful, as the 21-year-old went 0-for-2 in the contest. As a team, Baltimore racked up just one hit in the ballgame en route to getting blanked by the Blue Jays, 6-0. Yet, the date May 30th, 1982, will live on forever in the baseball world, as it marked the first of 2,632 straight games that Ripken Jr. would start in. An incredible, unbroken chain of events that lasted almost 16 years. On September 6th, 1995, ‘The Iron Man’ surpassed Lou ‘The Iron Horse’ Gehrig’s previous record of 2,230, and became the all-time leader in the history books. Barring an unfathomable run by a modern-day ballplayer, with the way the game is trending, it’s quite possible that Ripken Jr. will remain the king of the category until the end of time.
His 1983 award-winning season was an unparalleled one, as he became the youngest shortstop in the game’s storied history to finish a season with at least 200 hits and 25 home runs. A record that he held for 13 years before 20-year-old Alex Rodriguez came along and snagged it. Funny enough, Ripken’s teammate, first baseman Eddie Murray, gave him a run for his money in the MVP voting, earning 10 of the 28 first-place votes, but in the end, it was the kid from Maryland who took home the hardware. “I heard about the sophomore jinx plenty of times last year,” he said after winning the award for most outstanding player in the league. “I never believed in the sophomore jinx.”
In December of ’83, at the annual winter meetings, among many talking points that the owners planned to discuss, one subject matter in particular stood out: expansion. With the sport in a healthy place, setting a new record for total attendance, the league was aiming to grow its winning product by way of additional teams. With the last expansion taking place in 1977, when Toronto and Seattle were added to the field, giving the American League 14 teams, two more than the National League, the league had been planning to equalize the number of franchises in each league for quite some time, and now, with the idea on the agenda, it looked like a real possibility. In 1984, the same year that The Natural, starring Robert Redford, was released, a motion picture that enhanced baseball’s filmography, expansion talks heated up, and in November of ’85, two months after Pete Rose notched his 4,192nd base knock, breaking Ty Cobb’s all-time hits record, representatives from 13 cities (Buffalo, Denver, Phoenix, Indianapolis, Miami, Nashville, New Orleans, Vancouver, Columbus, Washington D.C., Tampa, St. Petersburg, and the northern New Jersey region) presented their cases with two vacant spots, for the immediate future, up for grabs.
Talks of any significance surrounding the growth of the National League cooled off throughout the latter half of the 80s. During this stretch, in 1987, Mark McGwire of the Oakland Athletics hit 39 home runs as a rookie, which, at the time, was the most ever for a first-year player. 1987 also marked the year when the Seattle Mariners used their first pick in the June Amateur Draft on a kid named Ken Griffey Jr., the son of Ken Griffey Sr., a 3-time All-Star and 2-time World Series Champion. With the selection, Griffey Jr. became the first son of a major league player to be picked number one overall. “We do basically everything the same,” said Junior, when asked about how his game stacks up against his father’s. “We hit, run, and throw the same.” In response to his 17-year-old son’s humble comments, Griffey Sr., who, unlike his offspring, had to wait until the 29th round before he was finally selected in the 1969 draft, had this to say: “To me, he’s got more power than I will ever have. He hits it a lot harder. At his age now, he’s a lot faster than I was.” Seattle’s Vice President for baseball operations, Dick Balderson, echoed Griffey Sr.’s sentiments, in praise of “The Kid.” “We think he’s a complete player,” he said after picking the Moeller High School star. “He’s an above-average runner, an above-average hitter, has above-average power.”
As one all-time talent was getting ready to make his mark, another was calling it quits. In May of 1989, Mike Schmidt retired after struggling to get back to form after suffering a significant shoulder injury during the ’88 season. While fighting back tears, Schmidt, in a football locker room in San Diego, had this to say amid his retirement announcement: “Some 18 years ago, I left Dayton, Ohio, with two very bad knees and a dream to become a major league baseball player. I thank God that dream came true.”The moment he hung up his jersey and put away his cleats for good, with his statistics now final, baseball enthusiasts could finally have the debate, using fixed numbers, with one another to settle who the greatest third baseman of all time was. If you fancy the long ball, then Schmidt is your guy, as he hit 35 home runs in 11 different seasons and finished with a grand total of 548 four-baggers. A number that, at the time, was good for 7th on the all-time list. Though Schmidt’s 10 Gold Gloves are nothing to scoff at, when it comes to defense at the hot corner, Baltimore Orioles legend Brooks Robinson takes the cake. During his storied career, the 18-time All-Star won 16 Gold Gloves, which are the most of any position player in MLB history. Other names in the conversation for Greatest of All-Time (GOAT) third baseman at the time of Schmidt’s retirement include Eddie Mathews, who hit an impressive 512 home runs, and Pie Traynor, who, while competing from 1920-37, a glorious window of time that’s often cited as the game’s first golden age, had a lifetime batting average of .320. The other name in consideration would be Kansas City’s George Brett, who was still active but had already compiled enough gaudy statistics to set himself up for a first-ballot induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. In reference to the lofty question at hand, Bill James, an acclaimed baseball statistician who had Schmidt penciled in the 13th spot on his list of the greatest players of the 20th century, stated, “Mike Schmidt was the greatest third baseman ever.” James went on to mention that Schmidt was “overshadowed for several years by Robinson, and you might find an individual year or two where George Brett had better numbers. But Schmidt was a great defensive third baseman. The thing he never gets credit for is his consistency. He produced at a higher offensive level than Robinson.”
Speaking of Robinson, the 1963 AL MVP Award winner had nothing but love for Schmidt, but, being the fierce competitor that he was, wasn’t ready to pencil his position counterpart as the best to ever do it. Not because he didn’t think Schmidt was an all-time talent, but more because of the absurdity in the dialogue itself. “He is one of the greatest,” Robinson said. “I am not going to say he is the best of all time, but he is one of the best. I think it’s best to leave it at that. Some think Pie Traynor was the best. Others say Eddie Mathews. Those who think Mike is the best, that’s great. Those who think I’m the best, that’s great, too. How do you decide? It’s like, who’s the greatest heavyweight fighter ever?”
At the turn of the decade, chatter regarding expansion picked back up. In 1990, Major League Baseball announced their new regulations for the anticipated growth of the National League. By ’91, only six cities remained in the running, and on July 5th of that year, a pair of winners were selected. Coming by way of a unanimous decision via a telephone conference call, the 26 major league owners approved the decision to grant Denver and Miami the 13th and 14th spots in the National League. A frictionless agreement, effective immediately, with plans for the two teams to debut atop the 1993 season. Denver’s team would be dubbed the Colorado Rockies, in honor of the area’s adjacency to the Rocky Mountains, and Miami’s team would be christened the Florida Marlins. Though there were talks about the Marlins going by the Miami Marlins or South Florida Marlins, the team’s new owner, H. Wayne Huizenga, settled upon the regional name with the hope that its broader title would help them extend the brand, from a marketability standpoint, all the way from Key West to the Georgia border. After officially becoming the first major league baseball team to suit up in the Sunshine State, Huizenga, an astute businessman who founded Waste Management, Inc., and co-owned Blockbuster Video, ecstatic over the news, was quoted saying, “Champagne for everyone. It will be an exciting day in April 1993 at Joe Robbie Stadium when the first pitch is thrown out by the Florida Marlins.”
The team opted to mimic the Miami Dolphins’ color scheme, claiming aqua, orange, silver, and black as their official team hues, gelling well with the washed-out, tropical vibe that many often associate with South Florida. From there, their authorized logo was born, a Marlin whose pointy bill and curled-around tail protruded outside of the emblem’s circle, a baseball-sheltering ring that, on its perimeter, read “FLORIDA MARLINS.” Their primary caps kept the hard-bitten Marlin but ditched the circle in favor of an ‘F.’ Among those in the area most excited were those in the merchandise industry. Upon the unveiling of the new logo, sporting goods stores around the block put in orders for T-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, mugs, key chains, and more products featuring the new team in town. Mike Graham, owner of Superstar Sporting Goods in West Palm Beach, expressed his excitement for the impending merchandise, telling The Palm Beach Post, “As soon as this stuff hits the floor, it will jump out of here.” Oddly enough, at the time, the hottest-selling hat at Graham’s store was the Chicago White Sox lid, a team led by rising phenom Frank Thomas, as the team’s recent rebrand was a hit on the streets. Due to its growing appreciation, the unmistakable all-black hat with the slick white-lettered emblem was given a boost on the market when top-tier artists in the hip-hop community added it to their getup. Legendary West Coast rapper Ice Cube sported the White Sox hat in his iconic music video for his song “Steady Mobbin’,” the first single off his second album Death Certificate. A year later, Dr. Dre donned it in the “Nuthin’ But a G Thang” video. The classic hat even found its way to the big screen, in a snapback model, when iconic actor, rapper, and songwriter Tupac Shakur wore it while playing the role of Lucky in John Singleton’s 1993 film Poetic Justice.
While there’s no denying the simplistic beauty of the White Sox brim, people were hungry to support the team responsible for ushering in the game’s first fish as their mascot. In just their first month and a half on the shelves, the Marlins sold over 200,000 teal and black hats and quickly became one of the top-selling brims in the game. Before a pitch was even thrown, Florida was already in the winning column.
Once the logistics were ironed out, and the team was guaranteed to look good, it was time for the franchise to turn their focus to the impending product on the field. Starting from the ground up, in early 1992, ahead of the amateur draft in June, Florida began to build out their minor league system. Pulling from various college ballplayers who never got drafted, prospects who had been released by an MLB team, and international talent, the Marlins’ front office went to work. Among the first set of players they signed was a 16-year-old, right-handed shortstop out of Colombia named Edgar Rentería. In June’s draft, the team decided to stay in-state when evaluating the top crop of talent, using their 28th pick in the first round on Charles Johnson, a catcher from Fort Pierce, FL, who played college ball at the University of Miami. After the annual draft, Florida signed a few more amateur players, including a 16-year-old Dominican infielder named Luis Castillo, before shifting their attention to the upcoming expansion draft.Every time the sport opts to add to its list of franchises, to pack the new rosters, a pool of eligible players is compiled, which the oncoming ball clubs pull from in alternating fashion. From an operations standpoint, the rules are as follows: Ahead of the draft, each MLB team chooses a maximum of 15 players to keep within their organization. When evaluating who to protect, teams must analyze not just their 40-man roster, but also minor leaguers within their system who have completed at least three seasons of professional baseball. If a player falls under one of these two categories and is not chosen as one of the 15 that the team opts to protect, his name gets tossed into the draft. Players who are ineligible for the expansion draft include free agents, anyone with a “no-trade” clause in their contract, and what the league refers to as ‘five-and-10’ players—guys who have at least 10 years of major league experience and who have also logged a minimum of five years on their current ball club. In addition, for the 1992 expansion draft in particular, any minor leaguer who was drafted out of college before 1991, or high school before 1990 (unless they are already on the 40-man roster), is unfit for the draft.To provide clarity using a real-life example, the Atlanta Braves retained players like Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, and David Justice, a trio of blossoming stars who kicked off their careers in the latter half of the 80s. Thanks to the aforementioned guidelines, Atlanta did not have to reserve a spot for one of their top prospects, shortstop Chipper Jones, who was selected first overall, out of high school, in the 1990 draft. As many know, the switch-hitting Jones would wind up moving over to third, play 19 illustrious seasons for the Braves, hit 468 home runs, win an MVP, post a lifetime batting average of .303, and pencil his name in the ‘greatest third baseman of all time’ conversation with Schmidt, Mathews, Brett, Robinson, and Traynor.
Gazing around the league, notable players who were wisely kept, in preparation for the future by their present team, include: Mike Mussina (Baltimore Orioles), Frank Thomas (Chicago White Sox), Jim Thome (Cleveland Indians), Ken Griffey Jr. (Seattle Mariners), Ivan Rodriguez (Texas Rangers), Sammy Sosa (Chicago Cubs), and Jeff Bagwell (Houston Astros), among others. Deciding to retain guys like Griffey Jr. and Thomas was a no-brainer, as the two, though both under 25, had already proven they could excel at the big-league level. On the other hand, choosing to keep a player like Sammy Sosa was a move that involved a bit more thinking. Sure, he was only in his age-23 season in 1992, but from 1989-91, Sosa hadn’t done much of anything in the majors. In 1,031 at-bats, he hit just .228 and was averaging just 14 home runs per 162 games. Yet, Chicago must have seen something that was imperceptible in the box score. More to come on Sammy Sosa in the ensuing chapters.
As touched upon, players who were granted free agency after the ’92 season were off-limits. So if Florida or Colorado wanted to make a run at Greg Maddux or Barry Bonds, they would have to wait until after the draft was over before attempting to reach an agreement. As is known, neither newcomer was able to convince Bonds, who had already won an MVP while playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates, or Maddux, who just won the 1992 NL Cy Young Award while shining for the Chicago Cubs, to take a chance on one of the new kids on the block. Maddux went with Atlanta, and Bonds, following in the footsteps of both his father, Bobby, and godfather, Willie Mays, signed with the San Francisco Giants.
Once the 15-man protected lists were set in stone, it was time for the Marlins and Rockies to pull from the pool of undesired. The 1992 expansion draft, held in November, consisted of three rounds, where each team picked 12 players. To keep things in check, both the American League and National League would each lose 36 players, no more, no less. In order to align with this aim, all 12 of the National League teams would lose a maximum of one player per round. The 14 American League teams would surrender a former player during the first two rounds. Then, in the final round, eight of those 14 teams would lose a player.
After a coin flip decided who would pick first, the two teams were off to the races. Looking to land a diamond in the rough, or several for that matter, the Rockies kicked off the draft by selecting the consensus number-one player available, right-handed pitcher David Nied. To many, the fact that Nied had gotten tossed in the mix of unwanted was a major stunner. Drafted by the Atlanta Braves in 1987, Nied climbed up Atlanta’s system with style, performing well at both the AA and AAA levels. His stellar starts in the minors granted him the opportunity to play for the ’92 Braves, where, in 23 innings for the team, Nied struck out 19 batters and posted an impressive 1.17 earned run average (ERA). Come playoff time, though he did not participate, when Nied’s teammate, pitcher Kent Mercker, went down with a reaggravated rib injury in the midst of celebrating Atlanta’s epic Game 7 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates in the National League Championship Series, the 23-year-old was called upon to fill his spot on the World Series roster. With that level of faith in his abilities, one would have assumed he would be there to stay for the coming years, yet Braves manager Bobby Cox and the rest of his staff must have had a crystal ball or something. Following his impressive stint with Atlanta, Nied went on to appear in just 46 games for the Rockies and was out of the league after the 1996 season. In 218.2 innings with Colorado, Nied went 14-18, with a 5.47 ERA.
With their first pick, Florida selected outfielder Nigel Wilson, a 22-year-old from the Toronto Blue Jays’ farm system. “I don’t know where to start,” Wilson said after getting the honor of being one of the first two players pulled from the mix. “I’ve never had anything like this happen to me before in all my life. I’m so happy, I’m almost in tears.” Unfortunately, the positive vibes were fleeting. Wilson struggled at the major league level, going just 3-for-35 in his 3-year career. Like Nied, he was out of the league in 1996. However, after faltering in America, Wilson didn’t give up on his dream. In 1997, he joined the Nippon Ham Fighters and hit 37 home runs in the Japan Pacific League. He would end up eclipsing the 30-home-run mark two more times in Japan (1998, 2000), before calling it quits.
Sticking by their original plan, which was to seek out talent for the future and construct their MLB roster primarily through the free-agent market, the Marlins used three of their next four picks in the first round on inexperienced but promising right-handed pitchers. One of them was Cincinnati’s Trevor Hoffman, a 25-year-old who had yet to make his MLB debut. With their 11th pick, Florida snagged 1B/OF Jeff Conine, who, in 37 career games with the Kansas City Royals, batted .252, with 9 extra-base hits and 11 RBI. They then used their first pick in the 2nd round on OF Carl Everett, a former first-round pick in the New York Yankees’ farm system. Notable names selected in the draft on Colorado’s side include Vinny Castilla, Joe Girardi, and Brad Ausmus. When all was said and done, Rockies manager Don Baylor was convinced that his team got the better hand in the selection process. “We beat them without a doubt in mind,” Baylor said. “After we decided we were going to go first, they reacted to us making our decisions. They were always one step behind us. We knew exactly what they wanted to do.”
Rather than paying any attention to Baylor’s cheeky remarks, Florida’s General Manager Dave Dombrowski poured all of his energy into his own roster and did so in swift fashion. The moment the expansion draft was over, ‘Trader Dave’ announced that the team would be exchanging four players that they had just selected for ready-to-go talent across the league. One of the players that Florida traded for was shortstop Walt Weiss, who won the American League Rookie of the Year award in 1988 as a member of the Oakland Athletics. “We have a team that could give other clubs a battle,” Dombrowski said after the set of trades. “I don’t think we’re going to win a pennant with the players we have right now. We picked some players who are just blending in on the big-league level. But it will make us a better club in the long run.”
Dombrowski was right. The team didn’t win a pennant, as they posted a losing record in every month of the season and finished 6th in the NL East with a record of 64-98, but baseball fans continued to appreciate their apparel. Florida sold more hats, shirts, jackets, and other team goods than every other team, aside from the Colorado Rockies and Chicago White Sox.