Mendoza Line

What does mendoza line mean?

.200 batting average

A baseball phrase that refers to SS Mario Mendoza whose batting average became the standard for competent hitting.

Through a clubhouse joke directed at his hitting woes, the phrase became popular with ESPN's Chris Berman and other analysts in the 1980s when describing how a player was hitting. If a player is hitting below the Mendoza line, he's not worth keeping in the lineup, no matter how great he is at defense. Although it's set at .200, Mendoza actually hit .215 over his career.

Example

He is getting real close to the Mendoza line
Yeah, he just might get benched!

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Updated April 6, 2015

Mendoza line definition by Slang.net - The Slang Dictionary

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