1994 Montreal Expos season

The 1994 Montreal Expos season was the 26th season of the franchise. They had the best record in Major League Baseball (74-40), when the 1994–95 Major League Baseball strike ended the season and the team's postseason aspirations. From June 1 forward, Montreal transformed into the dominant club in the league, going 46−18 until the strike. In turn, they also produced the most successful season in franchise history in terms of winning percentage (.649). Five Expos represented the National League at the All-Star Game held in Pittsburgh, including Moisés Alou, who had the game-winning hit for the National League.

1994 Montreal Expos
1st Place in NL East
Major League affiliations
Location
Other information
Owner(s)Claude Brochu
General manager(s)Kevin Malone
Manager(s)Felipe Alou
Local televisionThe Sports Network
(Dave Van Horne, Ken Singleton)

SRC
RDS Network
(Claude Raymond, Camille Dube)
Local radioCIQC (English)
(Dave Van Horne, Rich Griffin, Ken Singleton, Elliott Price)

CKAC (French)
(Jacques Doucet, Rodger Brulotte, Alain Chantelois)
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Offseason

Spring training

The Expos held spring training at West Palm Beach Municipal Stadium in West Palm Beach, Florida – a facility they shared with the Atlanta Braves. It was their 18th season at the stadium; they had conducted spring training there from 1969 to 1972 and since 1981.

Regular season

Opening Day starters

Summary

On April 13, 1994, Pedro Martínez took a perfect game through 7​1⁄3 innings versus the Cincinnati Reds until throwing a brushback pitch at Reggie Sanders led Sanders to immediately charge the mound, starting a bench-clearing brawl. Martínez ended up with a no-decision in the game, which the Expos eventually won 3–2.[5]

One amusing moment occurred on April 24 while playing the Dodgers at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. With one out in the third inning, right fielder Larry Walker caught a Mike Piazza fly ball and innocently handed it to young fan, six year old Sebastian Napier, thinking it was the third out of the inning. He noticed that José Offerman, already on base, was running at full speed. Walker managed to retrieve the ball from Napier, and held Offerman to third base. Embarrassed, Walker remarked that he "told the little kid that maybe next time I'll give him a ball when there are three outs instead of two. Everybody around him was laughing." Where Offerman was stationed made little difference as Tim Wallach homered on the next pitch, from Martínez, for two runs. True to his word, when the Expos assumed the field in the bottom half of the fourth inning, Walker gave Napier a signed ball, inducing a standing ovation.[6]

The National League suspended Walker four games starting June 24 for inciting a bench-clearing brawl by charging the mound in a game against Pittsburgh.[7]

The Expos team appeared to be reaching its potential in 1994. After June 1, Montreal transformed into the dominant club in the National League, going 46−18 until the players' strike halted the season on August 11.[8] In turn, they produced the most successful season in franchise history as they attained a major league best 74−40 record.[9][10][11] on pace for a 106-win season

Led by an ensemble of rising young stars including Martínez, Walker, Moisés Alou, Cliff Floyd, Mike Lansing and Jeff Fassero, the Expos scored 585 runs (5.13 per game) and allowed 454 runs (3.98 per game) through 114 games by Friday, August 12.[12] Their 1994 pitching staff was very nearly as good as that of their division rivals, the Atlanta Braves, as the Expos finished the strike-shortened season with an MLB-best 3.56 ERA, an MLB-high 46 saves and just 288 walks, the fewest in the Majors.[13]

Walker, with 86 RBIs, was well on his way to his first 100-RBI year; Ken Hill was on pace to win 23 games while Pedro Martínez was on pace to strike out more than 200 batters. Moisés Alou was hitting .339 and on pace to collect more than 200 hits for the first time in his career. Marquis Grissom was on pace to score 137 runs. Two other Expos, namely Alou and Walker, were also on pace to score more than 100 runs. The team was also drawing well at home: through 52 home games in 1994, 1,276,250 fans had attended Expos games, for an average of 24,543 per game. At that pace, the Expos would have had a good chance of drawing two million fans for the first time since 1983.[14] The season, however, was stopped due to the 1994 players' strike. The World Series, for which the Expos appeared to be destined, was never played and Montreal lost many of its players during the next season due to free agency and salary constraints and the team never recovered. The 1994 Montreal Expos team that could have been remains one of baseball's hot discussion points. The franchise would never reach the playoffs as the Expos again. The collapse of the Expos would eventually lead to the franchise's move to Washington, D.C., for the 2005 season to become the Washington Nationals.

When baseball returned for an exhibition series in Olympic Stadium in March 2014, the team was honored during a pregame ceremony, along with a banner with the words On se souvient Édition 1994 (We remember the 1994 season).

Game Log
1994 Regular Season Game Log (74–40) (Home: 32–20; Road: 42–20)

Games Cancelled
1994 Games cancelled
Legend
Expos win Expos loss All-Star Game Game postponed

Season standings
NL East W L Pct. GB Home Road
Montreal Expos 7440 0.649 — 32–20 42–20
Atlanta Braves 6846 0.596 6 31–24 37–22
New York Mets 5558 0.487 18½ 23–30 32–28
Philadelphia Phillies 5461 0.470 20½ 34–26 20–35
Florida Marlins 5164 0.443 23½ 25–34 26–30
Division leaders W L Pct.
Montreal Expos 7440 0.649
Cincinnati Reds 6648 0.579
Los Angeles Dodgers 5856 0.509
Wild card team W L Pct. GB
Atlanta Braves68460.597—
Houston Astros66490.5742​1⁄2
New York Mets55580.48712​1⁄2
San Francisco Giants55600.47813​1⁄2
Philadelphia Phillies54610.47014​1⁄2
St. Louis Cardinals53610.46515
Pittsburgh Pirates53610.46515
Colorado Rockies53640.45316​1⁄2
Florida Marlins51640.44417​1⁄2
Chicago Cubs49640.43418​1⁄2
San Diego Padres47700.40222​1⁄2

Record vs. opponents
1994 National League Records

Sources:
Team ATL CHC CIN COL FLA HOU LAD MON NYM PHI PIT SD SF STL
Atlanta —4–25–58–28–43–36–04–55–46–33–96–15–15–7
Chicago 2–4—5–76–64–54–83–32–41–41–65–56–35–45–5
Cincinnati 5–57–5—4–47–54–63–64–22–44–29–38–27–22–2–1
Colorado 2–86–64–4—3–95–54–64–25–12–42–35–53–78–4
Florida 4–85–45–79–3—2–43–32–76–44–61–65–12–43–7
Houston 3–38–46–45–54–2—1–82–43–35–18–45–58–28–4
Los Angeles 0–63–36–36–43–38–1—3–96–67–53–36–45–52–4
Montreal 5–44–22–42–47–24–29–3—4–35–48–212–05–77–3
New York 4–54–14–21–54–63–36–63–4—4–64–56–66–66–3
Philadelphia 3-66–12–44–26–41–55–74–56–4—5–44–84–84–3
Pittsburgh 9–35–53–93–26–14–83–32–85–44–5—3–31–55–5
San Diego 1–63–62–85–51–55–54–60–126–68–43–3—5–24–2
San Francisco 1–54–52–77–34–22–85–57–56–68–45–12–5—2–4
St. Louis 7–55–52–2–14–87–34–84–23–73–63–45–52–44–2—

Notable transactions
  • April 8, 1994: Juan Bell was signed as a free agent by the Expos.[15]

Major League debuts
  • Pitchers:
    • Joey Eischen (Jun 19)
    • Heath Haynes (Jun 1)
    • Rod Henderson (Apr 19)
    • Gabe White (May 27) [16]

Roster
1994 Montreal Expos
Roster
Pitchers Catchers

Infielders

 Outfielders Manager

Coaches

Player stats
= Indicates team leader

Batting

Starters by position

Note: Pos = position; G = Games played; AB = At Bats; H = Hits; Avg. = Batting Average; HR = Home Runs; RBI = Runs Batted In

Pos Player G AB H Avg. HR RBI
CDarrin Fletcher9428574.2601057
1BCliff Floyd10033494.281441
2BMike Lansing106394105.266535
3BSean Berry10332089.2781141
SSWil Cordero110415122.2941563
CFMarquis Grissom110475137.2881145
LFMoisés Alou107422143.3392278
RFLarry Walker103395127.3221986

Other batters
Player G AB H Avg. HR RBI
Lenny Webster5714339.273523
Lou Frazier7614038.271014
Juan Bell389727.278210
Rondell White409727.278213
Freddie Benavides478516.18806
Randy Milligan478219.232212
Tim Spehr52369.25005
Jeff Gardner18327.21901

Pitching

Starting pitchers
Player G IP W L SV ERA SO BB
Ken Hill23154.716503.328544
Pedro Martínez24144.711513.4214245
Jeff Fassero21138.28602.9911940
Butch Henry24107.18302.437020
Kirk Rueter2092.17305.175023

Relief pitchers
Player G IP W L SV ERA SO BB
John Wetteland5263.246252.836821
Mel Rojas5884.032163.328421
Jeff Shaw4667.15213.884715
Tim Scott4053.15212.703718
Gil Heredia3975.16303.466213

Other pitchers
Player G IP W L SV ERA SO BB
Heath Haynes43.20000.0013
Brian Looney12.000022.5020
Joey Eischen10.200054.0010
Gabe White723.21116.081711
Denis Boucher1018.20106.75177
Rod Henderson36.20109.4537

Award winners
  • Felipe Alou, Associated Press Manager of the Year
  • Felipe Alou, The Sporting News Manager of the Year Award

65th Major League Baseball All-Star Game

All-Star Game

Farm system
See also: Minor League Baseball
Level Team League Manager
AAA Ottawa Lynx International League Jim Tracy
AA Harrisburg Senators Eastern League Dave Jauss
A West Palm Beach Expos Florida State League Rob Leary
A Burlington Bees Midwest League Lorenzo Bundy
A-Short Season Vermont Expos New York–Penn League Terry Kennedy
Rookie GCL Expos Gulf Coast League Nelson Norman

[17]

References
  1. Delino DeShields page at Baseball Reference
  2. Randy Milligan page at Baseball Reference
  3. John Vander Wal page at Baseball Reference
  4. 1994 Montreal Expos Roster by Baseball Almanac
  5. "April 13, 1994 Cincinnati Reds at Montreal Expos play by play and box score". Baseball-Reference.com. April 13, 1994. Retrieved July 22, 2010.
  6. Cohen, Alan (December 21, 2015). "Larry Walker". Society of American Baseball Research. Retrieved January 8, 2017.
  7. Associated Press (June 24, 1994). "National League suspends Walker". The New York Times. Retrieved February 12, 2017.
  8. Cocoran, Cliff (March 28, 2014). "Le Grand Cinq: The five best teams in Montreal Expos history". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved February 11, 2017.
  9. Jaffe, Jay (December 15, 2016). "JAWS and the 2017 Hall of Fame ballot: Larry Walker". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved January 7, 2017.
  10. Simmons, Jeff (July 19, 2013). "What happened? Looking back at the 1994 Expos". Sportsnet. Retrieved January 8, 2017.
  11. Shea, John (February 10, 2015). "Strike thwarted Felipe Alou's dynamic Expos". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved January 8, 2017.
  12. https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/MON/1994-schedule-scores.shtml
  13. https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/MLB/1994.shtml
  14. https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/MON/1994-schedule-scores.shtml
  15. Juan Bell page at Baseball Reference
  16. http://www.thebaseballcube.com/statistics/1994/18.shtml
  17. Johnson, Lloyd, and Wolff, Miles, ed., The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball, 3rd edition. Durham, North Carolina: Baseball America, 2007
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