by Andrew Parker, The New York Times (sports section)
May 20, 2013

NEW YORK, NY – Silas Boone is having a bad season.  The London shortstop is hitting just .206, an average only recently inflated above the Mendoza Line after a 4-for-5 game yesterday against New Orleans.  With only four walks, his .227 on-base percentage is second-worst in the PEBA (the “leader” is fellow Pan-Atlantic shortstop Nathan Bolitho, currently mired in a horrific sophomore slump).  Of the few hits Boone has managed to collect this year, only nine have gone for extra bases.  Boone has crossed the plate a mere nine times and only driven in eight teammates.

It’s a season for the record books, all right – but Boone’s awful year doesn’t even sniff the “bottom five” all-time worst PEBA seasons.  Boone will have to fail mighty hard for a full season to join the elite company of some true PEBA trailblazers.  Any middle infielder or catcher can have a bad season or justify drawing a paycheck with his defense.  It takes true talent to do so for an entire season and earn a spot amongst the illustrious (disreputable?) all-time worst seasons.

5.  3B Ernest Mathis (2010, Omaha) – .194/.251/.313

Mathis is the only player in the bottom five who has ever had what could reasonably be called a good year.  He’s also the only player who was ever expected to be good.  Back in the inaugural season of 2007, Mathis made the Imperial League All-Star team.  He is also the only player to make the bottom five who is still in the league, though he did sit out the 2012 season before signing a two-year contract with Reno in October – a contract that looks like a steal so far, as Mathis appears to have rescued his career from the depths described herein.

Back in 2010, it looked like Mathis’s time in the PEBA was drawing to a close.  After an injury-plagued 2009, the Cyclones moved Mathis, long considered one of the best-fielding shortstops in the entire league, to third base.  The defensive transition was flawless – Mathis went on to win the only All-Leather award of his career at third that year – but his bat continued to suffer.  Observers at the time attributed his poor performance at the plate to his defensive transition, but the reality of the situation was that Mathis had been trending towards “recreational softball”-caliber hitting for a while.  Though the trend was not steep, his batting average dropped in 2008 and again in 2009.  He was striking out more, and it was only his stellar defense that allowed him to start 159 games at third for the Cyclones, a team that lost 103 games.  Not even his defense could save him from playing out his contract with Omaha as a utility infielder in 2011, when he managed to hit even worse than the previous year in his part-time role.

But Ernest Mathis wasn’t even the worst hitter on the Omaha Cyclones squad in 2010…

4.  DH/2B/CF Pedro Ramírez (2011, Yuma) – .167/.298/.255

How Pedro Ramírez accumulated 436 at-bats will forever remain a mystery.  Why he accumulated them primarily as a designated hitter is easy to explain – it’s Yuma management.  Ramírez was the semi-regular second basemen for Yuma the previous year, but the acquisition of David Goode pushed Ramírez out of his natural position and out of the field entirely.  Ramírez hit above the Mendoza Line for the only time in his major league career the previous year, and in Yuma, that’s enough to earn you a starting spot.  Ramírez struck out in a fabulous 30% of his at-bats in 2011 and collected only 26 extra-base hits all year.  Only his eye for the ball saved his season from a spot in the top three, as he was able to draw 70 walks and finish with an on-base percentage barely below .300, good enough for fourth-best on one of the worst professional baseball teams in history.

Fate knew what to do with Ramírez, though it had to prod the Yuma front office a little.  The Costa Rican native was arrested in his home country in December 2010 for involvement in a scheme to distribute illegally obtained prescription drugs on the black market.  Ramírez maintained his innocence throughout his trial, but was found guilty in April of the next year and sentenced to one year in prison.  For 2012, Yuma signed minor league free agent John Copestake and handed him the starting DH job, where the replacement-level player demonstrated just how awful Ramírez was by collecting 10 more extra-base hits in 99 fewer at-bats.  It was no surprise that Ramírez announced his retirement from professional baseball upon his release from prison two months ago.  His horrible play, more so than his criminal baggage, had forcibly retired him years ago.

3.  2B Si-on Yi (2010, Omaha) – .193/.242/.274

Now we come to the worst player on the 2010 Cyclones.  Si-on Yi, the second baseman on that ill-fated club, paired with Mathis to form what is unquestionably one of the worst-hitting infield tandems ever.  Even more fascinating is that Yi, just like Mathis, won an All-Leather award that year.

Yi was a natural shortstop who, like Mathis, was shifted out of his natural position that year.  As a second basemen, Yi, like Mathis, made a successful transition to his new position and took home an award to prove it.  The player causing all of the commotion?  Miguel Soto, acquired from Florida at the trading deadline the previous year.  Omaha’s defense was an embarrassment of riches, but it came at a price.

Watching Yi hit that year, or any year, was painful.  The owner of a swing that was nothing but holes, Yi didn’t even reach base in three-quarters of his at-bats.  Black holes suck less than Yi sucked that year.  He wasn’t even supposed to be a regular that season, as management’s failure to find another second basemen forced him into an everyday role.  The 2010 Omaha Cyclones own the seventh-lowest non-Yuma team batting average, and players like Yi and Mathis made it possible.

2.  C Ernesto Alicea (2010, Yuma) – .186/.238/.292
1.  C Ernesto Alicea (2008, Yuma) – .189/.236/.278

Now we come to the cream of the crop (mud of the ditch?  filth of the sewer?) – Ernesto Alicea, unquestionably the worst-hitting PEBA player of all-time.  Playing a skill position might excuse you from some amount of offensive incompetence, but that will only get you so far.  Alicea holds the honor (disgrace?) of being Yuma’s longest-tenured catcher, serving as the regular at the position for the first four years of the franchise’s existence.  His play seems to indicate he was determined to make them the team’s last.

Though Alicea owns the two worst offensive seasons of all-time, his tenure with Yuma is deserving of further exploration.  It is, quite simply, a disgustingly fascinating car wreck.

Alicea’s PEBA career – those four years in Yuma – has earned him impressive (embarrassing?  yes, embarrassing) numbers.  His career OPS+ is 47.  His career batting average is .194.  His career RC/27 (2.4) would easily be the worst of all time if he had the total plate appearances for qualification.

It takes a special talent to suck harder than a black hole and keep a starting job with a professional baseball team.  Even Yuma, a team willing to start a player they openly despise, must have a breaking point.  Alicea never found it.  He even managed to land a gig in the minors of the Gloucester Fishermen for a season or two before signing his current contract with the Aguadilla Roadrunners of the San Juan Winter League.  The man deserves a lifetime achievement award for his ability to continually convince baseball teams he even knows which end of the bat to hold, despite all evidence to the contrary.  Alicea belongs on a baseball diamond as much as a fish belongs in a volcano.  On the moon.

Raise a glass to Ernesto Alicea, ladies and gentlemen.  He is a living legend.