Al Pepper's book "Mendoza's Heroes" profiles 50 major league baseball players who had career batting averages below .200, known as the "Mendoza Line." Pepper provides detailed biographies of these mostly forgotten players, from the 1870s to the 1990s, including familiar names like Bob Uecker and Tony LaRussa as well as many obscure players. The book aims to shed light on the careers of these mediocre hitters who nonetheless reached the major league level. Reviews praise the meticulous research and engaging storytelling that brings these players' careers to life.

1. From David Nemec:
Mendoza's Heroes is the kind of book that most editors in
publishing secretly read cover to cover and love, only then
to disappoint the writer by telling him or her that the
work is too quirky ever to find a large enough audience.
Thankfully, in Tom Hetrick, Al Pepper found an editor who
not only loved his book but realized that its very
quirkiness is what guarantees it plenty of readers.
Subtitled Fifty Batters Below .200, Mendoza's Heroes
turns the All-Time
Leaders board upside down and examines the playing careers
of half a hundred
performers who number among the very worst hitters in major
league history.
To be included in Pepper's singular pantheon, a player is
required to meet four criteria:
1. A career batting average below the Mendoza Line, which
Pepper establishes to be .200.
2. A minimum of 200 major league plate appearances.
3. Must have played the majority of his career as a
position player.
4. Must have completed his major league career prior to
1997.
To be sure, each of the criteria is arguable. Mario
Mendoza, the weak-hitting middle infielder of the late
1970s and early 1980s for whom the Mendoza Line is named,
actually had a career batting average of .215 and
consequently shows that the Line is drawn somewhat
arbitrarily by failing himself to qualify. Two hundred
plate appearances seems a bit low, and eliminating pitchers
from consideration deprives the reader of being introduced
to such intriguing early-day figures as Stump Wiedman who
compiled a .181 career batting average and .209 slugging
average while shuttling between the pitcher's box and the
outfield in the 1880s. Finally, we presume that Pepper put
the cutoff point at 1997 at least in part out of kindness
so as to avoid embarrassing any currently active major
leaguers.
But while we might quibble about Pepper's criteria, we
have no reservations about recommending his book.
Beginning with Bill Traffley, a hardnosed catcher who first
appeared on the scene in the 1870s, and ending with Jose

2. Oliva, the free-swinging all-or-nothing 1990s third baseman
whose career slugging average was more than double his
batting average, Mendoza's Heroes shares with us fifty
meticulously researched portraits of former major leaguers
from all eras of history. Along with the familiar names
like Bob Uecker and Tony La Russa, there are swarms of
fascinating characters that the vast majority of readers
will be meeting for the first time.
We can't wait for Pepper to do the same honors for
beleaguered pitchers that he has done in Mendoza's Heroes
for overmatched hitters.
From Gene Carney (3 APR 02)
WHOSE LINE IS IT, ANYWAY?
When I was invited by SABRite Al Pepper to review
his book Mendoza's Heroes: 50 Batters Below .200
(Pocol Press, 2002) even before it was published,
I agreed, but I warned Al that I knew Mario
Mendoza, and he was no .200 hitter. He hit .215
in his undistinguished career, and I only knew
that because Mario was once a Pirate. But why
quibble, most baseball fans know the phrase "the
Mendoza Line," and know what it means.
In Heroes, Al Pepper works hard to tell fifty
stories of ballplayers that finished their
careers with batting averages below .200.
Besides the sub-.200 average, here are the
criteria: 200 plate appearances in a major league
(no cups-of-coffee types); the majority of games
played as a position player (no pitchers); and no
games played since 1996 (no active players, like
the Hall of Fame.) Anybody spring to mind?
Anybody?
The most famous selection in Heroes is probably
Tony LaRussa, although thanks to TV and movies,
Bob Uecker may be more recognizable to the
average fan. (To be fair to Ueck, he hit .1997,
but Pepper refused to round up, like the record
book, and readers will be glad about this, since
this story is one of the most interesting, and
funny.)

3. This is one of those books…that different fans
will find interesting for different reasons. For
example, three of the six "heroes" (probably not
the most accurate term) chosen from the period
1920-1962 -- Herman Franks, Charlie Metro, and
Gair Allie -- were of interest to me because they
were familiar names. Met fans will read every
word about Choo-Choo Coleman; Reds fans will do
the same for Bill Plummer, the catcher who played
behind Johnny Bench. 'Way behind.
I was surprised that Brian Doyle, a post-season
hero for the 1978 Yankees, was a lifetime .161 --
turns out that nine of his lifetime forty-one
hits came in that October. Another surprise was
Charlie Manuel -- what a great salesman this guy
must be, to convince anyone to hire him as
batting instructor after a career .198!
…I found myself applauding Al Pepper's effort to
make his heroes interesting. At times, he
succeeded, but at other times, he fell -- well,
below the literary Mendoza Line. And it was not
all his fault, some of his subjects were just too
plain.
The research makes the book worth the look. It
took the author years to track down the players,
and he obviously spent a lot of time in old
newspaper accounts and box scores. There is
almost excitement when a hero goes on a tear, or
wins a game with a clutch hit, or pounds the only
homer of their career.
The book is well-organized, and the stats are all
there at the end -- in case readers had doubts, I
guess, that these heroes were really that inept
as hitters. Hey, they made a book, how bad can
they be? Oh ... never mind. But they were, as
Pepper reminds us, good enough to play at the
game's top level. Not well, not for long, but
good enough to -- make a top fifty list.
Dave Baldwin (Former major league pitcher in
Amazon.com)

4. Excellent biographical sketches, December 12, 2003
The difference between a line drive into the left field
bleachers and a pop-up to the shortstop is a matter of a
few vertical millimeters on the bat. In this well-written,
entertaining book, Al Pepper gives us some insight into the
careers of fifty ballplayers who were just that close to
being stars. In fact, they were that close consistently.
Although these players had batting averages in common,
their stories are surprisingly varied. Pepper does a good
job of keeping the narrative moving and the reader will
learn a great deal about the twists and turns of baseball
careers.
Brian Ames (Author of Smoke Follows Beauty)
Mendoza's Heroes give rare insight into The Game, July 11,
2002
"Mendoza's Heroes" is a treat for any fan of baseball books
- indeed, all true lovers of the game will be quickly
caught in Al Pepper's world of sub-.200 batsmen.
Meticulously researched and engagingly written, the stories
of these mediocre Major Leaguers unfold across the course
of the three centuries pro-ballers have been attempting to
smash that stitched sphere into fair play (and beyond).
From William Traffey of the 1878s Chicago White Stockings
and 1883s Cincinnati Red Stockings to Mike Stenhouse, whose
four-year MLB career a hundred years later spanned "cups of
coffee" with the Expos, Twins and Red Sox, readers get rare
insight into the workin' level of The Game. From the
ubiquitous Bob Uecker to Ray Oyler, Bill Plummer, and Mario
Mendoza himself (all in my own personal pantheon because
they wore Mariner blue), readers are treated to a behind-
the-scenes look at the guys who batted just a little better
than you and I might (although their other on-field
accomplishments are heroic in many instances). Slug-stars
they are not, especially in this era of Bonds, Sosa and
McGwire. Even so - by virtue of appearing in Major League
uniform - neither are they mere mortals. Fun reading this,
and congratulations to Pepper for a terrific, offbeat,
homespun style that makes you want to read "just one more"
of the player bios. "Mendoza's Heroes" is a grand slam for
Pocol Press, which is batting 1.000 with its line of books
Josh Prager (Wall Street Journal)

5. let's hear it for the bench warmer, June 7, 2002
the superstars get all the ink. but the slap-hitter, the
third-string catcher, that's where the fun is. and al
pepper has done a good job mining the ranks of the
unimpressive for interesting nuggets and storylines.
'mendoza's heroes' is a fun read.
Baseball Almanac:
"A truly creative approach to a rarely researched topic
makes Mendoza's Heroes one of [our] 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."
Note: Mendoza’s Heroes was awarded Baseball-Almanac.com’s
Book of the Month Award for NOV/DEC 03
Pierre Antoine (Legends of Sports Newsletter):
"Fascinating biographies from baseball's fringe."
Budd Bailey:
One of the cute phrases in baseball is "The
Mendoza Line." It has come to represent a .200
batting average in baseball. In other words, if
you are hitting above the Mendoza Line, you are
at least a .201 hitter. On the other hand, to be
below the Mendoza Line is a sign that you
shouldn't exactly buy a house in your current
major league city, because you might be headed
for the minors any day now.
The Mendoza in question is Mario Mendoza, a
classic good field/no hit shortstop from the
1970's and 1980's. Mendoza is mostly remembered
for playing with the Pirates, although he bounced
to some other teams. He probably became famous
because Hall of Famer George Brett said he liked
to look up the batting averages in the Sunday
paper to see who was below "the Mendoza line."

6. Mario himself reportedly doesn't like the term
that much, but Al Pepper is quite fond of the
concept. In fact, he did some math to figure out
who were the 50 most productive batters in
history below the Mendoza Line, and has written a
book on the subject called "Mendoza's Heroes."
Pepper has gone through the history of baseball
and found several players whose career batting
average started with "one." I was a little
surprised at how many of them I've heard of,
although that may reflect a childhood spent
collecting baseball cards rather than their
individual exploits. However, names such as Choo
Choo Coleman, Ray Oyler, Bob Uecker, Brian Doyle
and John Vukovich might sound familiar. (Pepper
made the wise decision to include such people as
Tony La Russa, who went on to bigger things in
baseball when they were done not hitting as a
player.)
It's pretty obvious that Pepper did his homework
here. He covers each of the 50 players quite
well, even including some post-baseball facts in
many cases. If Mike Ryan had a big bunt to lead
the Boston Red Sox to a victory, it's mentioned
in this book.
If you really, really like baseball history and
know some of the people listed, this may bring a
few smiles to your face.
Harvey Frommer’s “Sports Book Review”
From Pocol Press in Clifton, Virginia comes "Mendoza's
Heroes" by Al Pepper ($17.95, 250 pages). Sometimes
humorous, always involving, this paperback entry focuses on
fifty batters who failed to hit above .200 in their
careers. We are treated to up close and personal looks at
Mario Mendoza (the "Mendoza line" originated with him) Doug
Camilli, Brian Doyle, Tony LaRussa, Charlie Metro, Bob
Uecker and others of this strange fraternity.

7. Mendoza's Heroes
Rating: 4 Stars (out of 5)
While Albert Pujols flirts with the proverbial “Mendoza Line,” one would consider his
$30 million dollar a hefty price tag for someone whose output is resembling that of Luis
Pujols (no relation), the former catcher for the Houston Astros in the late 1970’s and
early 1980’s. For every superstar such as the younger Pujols, rosters across major league
baseball have been filled with good-glove, no-hit backup infielders, fifth outfielders and
defensive-minded catchers in the mold of the elder Pujols.
Pocol Press

8. Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images
Light-hitting crusaders such as Choo Choo Coleman, Brian Doyle, and Ray Oyler are
valiantly profiled in Al Pepper’s book, “Mendoza’s Heroes: Fifty Batters Below .200.”
Pepper provides vivid details on the un-heralded careers of these blue-collar players that
struggled mightily at the plate in the majors. Included in the bunch are players that would
go on to become stellar major league managers, Herman Franks, Charlie Manuel, and
future Hall of Famer Tony LaRussa who is the owner of a career .199 average.
While nobody expects Pujols to be celebrated as the next of Mendoza’s Heroes, Pepper’s
attention to the careers of these anonymous journeymen is a keen reminder that many in
baseball have spent their entire careers fighting through the struggles that have the power
to humble even the game’s biggest star.