Mendoza Line is a somewhat informal term used in the sport of baseball.
Both the origin of the term, and the actual placement of the "line," have been subjects of debate.
According to one version, a long-time minor-league player named Minnie Mendoza (born Cristóbal Rigoberto Mendoza in Ceiba del Agua, San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba on November 16, 1933) finally caught on with a major-league team — specifically the Minnesota Twins — in 1970 at the age of 36. He appeared in 16 games for the Twins that year, and recorded a batting average of .188.
Another, and more popular, explanation for the Mendoza Line's origins centers around Mario Mendoza; a Mexican player who spent nine years in the major leagues (1974-82) with three different teams, the Pittsburgh Pirates, Seattle Mariners and Texas Rangers, and was a career .215 hitter.
Both Minnie Mendoza and Mario Mendoza played the same position in the field — shortstop, a position long associated with weak hitting.
In the years immediately following Mario Mendoza's retirement, some journalists began referring to the .215 figure as "the Mendoza Line;" more recently, however, it has become customary to place the "line" at .200 (following George Brett's use of the term in this sense during an interview with a sportswriter), perhaps in an attempt to find a middle ground between Minnie Mendoza's lifetime batting average and that of Mario Mendoza, since it is not universally agreed upon as to which one of them the term is truly named after.
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