My First Cards

Really, Sixto Lezcano is the beginning of the story of the 1982 baseball season.

It all started on December 12, 1980, when he was sent to the Cardinals, from the Brewers.

Milwaukee received three extremely important puzzle pieces from that trade, which would help them to the ’81 playoffs and to win the American League in ’82 — Rollie Fingers, Pete Vuckovich, and Ted Simmons.

After a season in St Louis, the Cardinals wrapped him in a package to the Padres that brought Ozzie Smith to St Louis.

Those two trades helped the Brewers and Cardinals get the parts they needed to reach the playoffs and face off in a classic seven game series to decide the World Champion in October ’82.

In the meantime, Sixto would spend his time in San Diego producing one of the most underrated seasons of the 80′s.

His 7.2 WAR (Wins Above Replacement) in ’82 still stands as the 7th best single-season WAR in Padre history (through 2009). It was also the highest he’d ever earned, and good enough for 4th best WAR in the National League—

Back in ’82 though, there was no such view provided by WAR or OPS+ yet, and so BA and RBI’s were very overvalued. So Sixto not only didn’t receive any MVP votes, but he wasn’t even considered the best batter on his own team! Yep, his teammate Terry Kennedy actually got some MVP votes, based on 5 more HR’s, 13 more RBI’s, and a batting average only .006 better than Sixto.

While Sixto’s traditional stats—16 homers, 84 RBI’s, .289 average—aren’t MVP impressive, his OBP, OPS+, and being in the top 4 WAR in his league, is very impressive. I’m not saying he should’ve been the MVP, but he certainly should be considered the best player on the Padres in 1982, even if nobody realized this in 1982…or 1983… or 1984.. etc.

There’s one more thing that makes Sixto’s season so much better than you knew, and that’s how he hit so much better against his division rivals than against other teams. Check this out—

He hit like a Hall of Famer when facing teams the Padres needed to beat, if they were going to have a chance to win the division and reach the playoffs. What more could you want?

Unfortunately, Sixto Lezcano’s season came to an early end when he was hit in the hand by a Bob Welch pitch in the 1st inning of the epic 16 inning game against the Dodgers on September 13.

This makes his stat totals all the more intriguing, since he would’ve had more HR’s, RBI’s, WAR, and RC, if he hadn’t been injured with 20 games left on the schedule (including the 9/13 game). Add to that, the fact that the rest of San Diego’s schedule was against NL West teams too, so he certainly would’ve done well and affected the outcome of the division pretty deep.

Imagine if he’d played in that final series of the season against the Braves? Yeah, the Dodgers might’ve won the West, instead of losing the division on that final weekend. Maybe there would’ve been a 1 game playoff. Maybe the Giants would’ve snuck past them all. Might the Braves have won the division sooner and been more rested and beaten the Cardinals in the playoffs? It’s all speculation of course, but it really makes me wonder.

What we know for sure is that the Padres had just lost 2 games at the time of the injury, but Sixto was still hitting well, going 4 for 7 with a walk in those two games. The Padres fell from 5.5 GB to 10 GB within a week of his injury forcing him out of the lineup.

I just can’t help but be fascinated by how this overlooked player having an overlooked career year, had so much affect on how the ’82 season played out. From teams he no longer played for or against (remember this is pre-interleague so he couldn’t face the Brewers), to the team he was on, and the teams in his division. He wasn’t the whole year or all of the story, but Sixto Lezcano is where everyone should start telling the story— of 1982, a season so underrated and overlooked.