Outside The Lines: 1994 Expos

[metroflip73]

Saw part of it the other night. I completely forgot that this team was 74-40 and had some of the best players in the game at the time.

Marquis Grissom
John Wetteland
Pedro Maaaaah-tinez
Larry Walker
Moises Alou
Cliff Floyd

there were others mentioned, but I forgot who. I can honestly admit that if they had played the Yankees that year, they would have spanked them and they Yanks had a good team that year, Paul O'Neill was leading the AL in hitting and if I remember correctly, it was a decnt year for Donnie Baseball.

The players, most of the good ones even, would have wanted to keep playing for the team due to most of them coming up together, but due to the lockout, the team lost $17 million and had to trade/not re-sign players. Thus, the team that would have been a juggernaut and possibly beat out the Braves in the NL, gave up and had a fire sale just to recover lost revenues...

What could have been...

***Sigh***

[Glenwood Lane United]

Ken Hill was 16-5 that year. Jeff Fassero was the #3 pitcher.

[Detlef]

Darrin Fletcher was the catcher, he played at the U of Illinois.
Mel Rojas had 16 saves, unbelievable!

in 1993 they finished 94-68, just 3 GB Philadelphia. .....

[655321]

Is this a special on TV?? Anyone know when it might be on again? My roommate is from Montreal and has pretty much ignored baseball for the last few years due to his depression concerning the Expos.

[ElJefe]

Killing the '94 Expos basically killed baseball in Montreal.

While they weren't the greatest draw in baseball in the last '80s/early '90s, they were a terrific draw the last time they were good in the early '80s, up near the top of the NL in attendance for several years straight. And had the season actually been completed, the Expos were sure to have draw 2 million fans.

The strike and the subsequent dismantlining of the team killed that.

[(TxT)]

Didn't they also have the Big Unit or was he in Seattle by then?

[Glenwood Lane United]

Didn't they also have the Big Unit or was he in Seattle by then?

No, he went to Seattle in 1989 with P Brian Holman and P Gene Harris for Mark Langston, and a player to be named later, who turned out to be P Mike Campbell.

Langston signed with California as a FA after the season.

[KDdidit]

What's amazing about that that team was the ages, in ()

IF: Darrin Fletcher (27), Cliff Floyd (21), Mike Lansing (26), Sean Berry (28), and Wil Cordero (22)
OF: Marquis Grissom (27), Moises Alou (27), and Larry Walker (27)
Starters: Ken Hill (28), Pedro Martinez (22), Jeff Fassero (31), Kirk Rueter (23), and Butch Henry (25)
Bullpen: John Wetteland (27), Mel Rojas (27), Gil Heredia (28), and Jeff Shaw (27)

They also had Rondell White (22), Lenny Webster (29), and Tim Spehr (27) on the bench and I think Miguel Batista in the minors..

Nobody in the field was older that 28 and Fassero was the only pitcher over 30 and he's still pitching. I'm not much for the "what if's" in sports but the Expos do make me step back and wonder.

[hobbes]

I don't think enough is made of how the 94 strike killed baseball in Montreal for good. A lot of people talked a good game about turning their back on baseball (when someone like WP Kinsella decides to never pay to see another baseball game, you know the sport has troubles), but Montrealers did so. I mean they were up and down anyway, but after years of trading away their best players because they couldn't afford to keep them, they have the best team in 30 years and they don't get anything out of it. I can see wanting to wash my hands of the whole works for good too.

I know a guy who went 60-70 games a year and he and his friends never went back after 94. He's still bitter, trust me, he will talk about the 94 Expos with no prompting for HOURS.

cheers,
hobbes

[DoyleG]

My mother has been a lifelong Expos fans. Last game I was at was in '96.

The strike did in the team. Other events finished it off.

[metroflip73]

Crying shame. They would have beaten the tar outta my Yankees that year, and they had a good team too.

[yossarian]

Ken Hill was 16-5 that year. Jeff Fassero was the #3 pitcher.

Yep, and the Braves couldn't touch Hill at that year. I remember Terry Pendleton would actually bat right handed against Hill (a right-hander, IIRC) despite being a great switch hitter because he was just having no luck whatsoever against him batting left-handed. Nobody in Atlanta was counting the Braves out after the way they had caught the Giants the year before but it certainly looked like that Expos team would've been hard to stop.

[Robert25]

That strike really hurt baseball and the Expos. Since then they have never gotten as good as they were then. All their talent leaves as soon as they are in a contract year.

baseball in Montreal seems about dead, sad as it maybe.

[quicksand]

Such a shame what happened.

I actually wanted to go back and read some more on what happened and the first result on Google was, what else, but this thread.

[DoyleG]

What's amazing about that that team was the ages, in ()

IF: Darrin Fletcher (27), Cliff Floyd (21), Mike Lansing (26), Sean Berry (28), and Wil Cordero (22)
OF: Marquis Grissom (27), Moises Alou (27), and Larry Walker (27)
Starters: Ken Hill (28), Pedro Martinez (22), Jeff Fassero (31), Kirk Rueter (23), and Butch Henry (25)
Bullpen: John Wetteland (27), Mel Rojas (27), Gil Heredia (28), and Jeff Shaw (27)

They also had Rondell White (22), Lenny Webster (29), and Tim Spehr (27) on the bench and I think Miguel Batista in the minors..

Nobody in the field was older that 28 and Fassero was the only pitcher over 30 and he's still pitching. I'm not much for the "what if's" in sports but the Expos do make me step back and wonder.

Nice to complie info and see how the players did after leaving the Expos.