Miami Marlins Legacy Series: Best Ever Third Basemen

1. Mike Lowell (939 appearances)

Mike Lowell was born on February 24th, 1974 in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Back in 1992, he was drafted in the 48th round by the Chicago White Sox, then again in 1995 in the 20th round by the New York Yankees. He made his major league debut with them three years later, going four-for-15 in eight games. After the season, they traded him to the Florida Marlins for Todd Noel, Mark Johnson, and Ed Yarnall.

Lowell, who is a testicular cancer survivor, is far and away the most prolific Florida / Miami Marlins third baseman. He has played in a franchise-fourth 981 games for the Marlins. While in the field, the only other positions he played were designated hitter, for those occasional inter-league games, and second base, eight times in 2005. During his seven seasons with the Marlins, he made the all-star team three times and won a Gold Glove at third in 2005. He slashed .272/.339/.462 during his tenure with the club, hitting a franchise-fourth 143 round-trippers and collecting a franchise second-best 578 RBI, second only to Stanton’s 672. He also won his only Silver Slugger Award in 2003, when he hit 32 homers with 105 RBI while slugging a career-best .530.

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Lowell remained in shouting distance of the N.L. “average” third basemen in most of his seasons with the Marlins. The exception was his Gold Glove campaign, where he fielded at .983 and made only six errors in 1126 2/3 innings. He was worth 13 Rtot/yr, and closed his career with an overall third base fielding mark of .974, which was 18 points above the average mark for that time period.

Lowell went on to join the Boston Red Sox after the 2005 season, with Josh Beckett and Guillermo Mota for Jesus Delgado, Harvey Garcia, Hanley Ramirez, and Anibal Sanchez. That was one of those rare trades where both teams won.

For Lowell’s part, he went on to make the all star team one more time, in 2007, and made his last major league appearance in 2010.

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