Maddux And Glavine Are Hall Of Famers With No Help From The Marlins

Dec 9, 2013; Orlando, FL, USA; Bobby Cox , Joe Torre and Tony La Russa speak to a cable network after being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame during the MLB Winter Meetings at Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort. Mandatory Credit: David Manning-USA TODAY Sports

This week former Atlanta Braves pitchers Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine became the first pitchers elected to the Hall of Fame to have started a game against the Florida Marlins franchise.   The only other Hall of Famer to have pitched against the Marlins was Dennis Eckersley, who did so in relief during a stint with the St. Louis Cardinals at the end of his career.

By the time the Marlins came into existence as an expansion team in 1993, Maddux and Glavine were already well established stars together in the Braves rotation.  Playing in the National League East gave them plenty of opportunity to face the bad Marlins expansion rosters of the early years, as well as the atrocious post fire sale rosters of the late 1990’s.  With this in mind, I was ready to write about how the Marlins were big contributors to the stellar statistical records that eventually got them elected to the Hall of Fame.  Boy was I wrong; the Marlins actually handled these two better than almost any other team.

Here are the stats for Maddux and Glavine versus the Marlins, as visitors against the Marlins and their career numbers:

vs. Marlins

19

15

.559

42

265

2.92

1.075

6.1

0.78

at Marlins

9

8

.529

22

131

3.15

1.195

6.3

0.76

Career

355

227

.610

740

5008

3.16

1.143

6.1

0.63

Tom Glavine

W

L

W-L%

GS

IP

ERA

WHIP

K/9

HR/9

vs. Marlins

17

19

.472

49

301

4.03

1.472

5.5

0.84

at Marlins

7

13

.350

24

144

4.43

1.497

6.0

1.06

Career

305

203

.600

682

4413

3.54

1.314

5.3

0.73

Maddux’s .559 career winning percentage against the Marlins is his second worst against any team where he had more than 2 decisions.  Only the Arizona Diamondbacks were better against him, much better actually, as he was just 3-11 when facing them.  How good was this guy that a .559 winning percentage is his second worst, by the way.

Tom Glavine had an even tougher time against the Fish in his career.  His .472 winning percentage is also his second worst against any team with more than 1 decision and one of only two losing records against any team.  Glavine was just 4-11 against his old Atlanta Braves teammates during the 5 seasons he spent with the New York Mets late in his career.  Poor Glavine was particularly haunted when playing at the Marlins in Miami as his .350 winning percentage is his worst in any stadium where he had more than 3 decisions.

Current Marlins manager and former backup catcher, Mike Redmond, was famously Glavine’s arch nemesis posting a .438/.471/.604 slash line against him in 51 career plate appearances.  The feat becomes particularly impressive when you consider that Redmond was just a career .287/.342/.358 hitter.  Redmond even hit 2 of his career total 13 home runs off of Glavine.

I guess we should not expect either of these two guys to thank the Marlins franchise during their induction speeches this summer in Cooperstown.