Mendoza line n.

in baseball, "a low batting average," (somewhere around .200) with the suggestion that any player hitting below it ought to feel a bit ashamed, by 1984, said to have been in humorous use in baseball clubhouses c. 1979, from the name of former Pirate, Mariner, and Ranger shortstop Mario Mendoza, who was noted for his defense but whose .215 lifetime batting average routinely left him at the bottom of weekly batting averages. The surname is Basque.