End Of The Line: Mark Buehrle

End Of The Line is an occasional offseason series that will take a closer look at the career of DMBL players leaving the league after the 2016 season. Today, we look at Mark Buehrle, who burst on the scene in 2002.

Buehrle wins his 100th game

It took 14 starts but Mark Buehrle has his first win of the season -- and the 100th of his career. The left-hander scattered four hits and a run over seven innings while striking out four in a 4-1 home triumph against Philly last night.

The 100 wins puts him squarely in 20th place in all-time victories, breaking a tie with Jake Peavy, who's spent most of this season working on his mechanics in the Hopatcong minor league system.

The third overall pick of the 2002 draft, Buehrle went on to win the McDonald Award that year for the Columbia Crusaders, going 18-9 with a 2.32 ERA and wicked awesome 0.98 WHIP-- yet somehow losing out on the Listach Award for Rookie of the Year to Joel Pineiro (who did win 21 games). He's been among the steadiest starting pitchers in the DMBL over past decade despite being with his seventh franchise in the St. Louis Farrakhans. Through his first five seasons, Buehrle pitched no fewer than 220 innings in all but one of them, and routinely recorded two dozen or more decisions a year.

Buehrle also is closing in on the top 20 in innings pitched, trailing Barry Zito and Bartolo Colon. He's third among active pitchers in complete games with 31 (behind Roy Halladay and Roy Oswalt), which ties him for 15th all-time with Mike Morgan. He's also within the top 30 in career starts, with 259.

Buehrle is just 1-5 this season with a team-high 6.37 ERA. The losses have added up, putting him just two away from 100 for his career (which puts him 18th in league history).

Pudge calls it quits

When Ivan Rodriguez announced his retirement last week, he bid farewell to the DMBL for good. He had 137 plate appearances in MLB last year, leaving him 67 short of DMBL eligibility for 2012.

He certainly will be on the ballot for the DMBL Hall of Fame by 2017, and as a longtime catcher, likely will get heavy consideration on his first try. If it's not Pudge leading catchers in a career batting category, it's Mike Piazza.

Pudge spent much of his career with his original franchise, the now defunct-Columbia Crusaders. He was the face of the franchise since being selected in the 6th round (50th overall) in the 1993 draft and spent 12 seasons with the Crusaders/Rattlesnakes. He was a two-time all-star (1996 and 2001) and appeared in a DMBL-record 18 seasons.

After Columbia left the DMBL, Pudge was a bit of a vagabond catcher -- left unprotected but usually being drafted -- playing for five different teams in his final six seasons. Much of his final three years was spent as a part-time player, logging 190 games with three different squads.

Most impressively, between breaking into the DMBL in 1993 and 2008, Pudge played no fewer than 130 games a year with the exception of one season (2002, 102 games, and of course, the strike-year of 1995). He leads catchers in career hits, at-bats, doubles and games played (tantalizingly close to 500 doubles, and 2,000 "official" games), and trails Piazza in most other categories.

Entering the 2012 season, he ranked 6th all-time in games played with 1,991 -- only Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Chipper Jones, Manny Ramirez and Vlad Guerrero have "officially" played more. He also finishes 4th in doubles with 490 (surpassed only by Edgar Martinez, Chipper and Manny).

(Games played wasn't an official stat in the early days of the DMBL and many old-timers have incomplete records for the category. Rodriguez certainly played more than 2,000 games but the 1994 and 1996 seasons are incomplete, and he likely played as many as 300 games in those two years considering his number of at-bats.)

Other career stats for Pudge:

Batting average: .282
On-base: .313
Slugging: .439
OPS: .752
AB: 8,318 (7th)
H: 2,370 (7th -- ahead of Roberto Alomar, 2,207, behind A-Rod, 2,436)
HR: 263 (30th -- ahead of Javy Lopez, 260, behind Bobby Abreu, 264)
RBI:  1,100 (18th -- ahead of Rafael Palmeiro, 1,099, behind Larry Walker, 1,103)
Runs: 821 (29th)
Strikeouts: 1,359 (19th; only 378 career walks)

R.I.P, Gary Carter

Baseball lost a legend yesterday with the death of Gary Carter.

"The Kid" was a long-time manager for the Honolulu Sharks. He also managed the Columbia Rattlesnakes and, most recently, the D.C. Bushslappers.

Carter was eligible in the first three seasons of the DMBL, but he never got the call. His best year during that stretch was the inaugural season of 1991, when he hit .254/.324/.406 in MLB.