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Miami Marlins Top 50 Of All-Time: 11. Gary Sheffield

Gary Sheffield ranks 24th on the All-Time list of home run hitters, with 509. He was a member of the Florida Marlins for parts of six seasons in the 1990's

Gary Sheffield, Florida Marlins, 1996
Gary Sheffield, Florida Marlins, 1996

Sheffield was a premiere power hitter for 22 Major League seasons in total. Drafted originally by the Milwaukee Brewers in the first round, sixth overall, of the 1986 amateur draft, he played four seasons with the Brewers before arriving in San Diego via trade prior to the 1992 season.

After being invited to his first All-Star appearance and being awarded his first Silver Slugger award in 1992, Sheffield was putting together another All-Star season when the Padres traded him, along with Rich Rodriguez, to the Marlins for Andres Berumen, Trevor Hoffman and Jose Martinez.

Slowed by injuries in 1994 and 1995, Sheffield enjoyed his best Florida season in 1996, finishing second in the NL with 42 home runs and sixth with 120 RBI. He led the league in OBP with a ridiculous .465, having walked a career high 142 times. He also took home his second career Silver Slugger award.

After a 1997 in which Sheffield posted more mortal numbers (.250, 21 home runs, 71 RBI in 135 games), he helped Miami to their first World Series title by hitting .320 with three home runs and seven RBI in the postseason.

Just after the start of the 1998 season, Sheffield was traded along with Manuel Barrios, Bobby Bonilla, Jim Eisenreich and Charles Johnson to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Mike Piazza and Todd Zeile.

In 558 games, He totaled 122 home runs and 380 RBI with 74 stolen bases for Florida, hitting .288 and walking 1.46 times more than he struck out, showing remarkable patience for a power hitter.

Sheffield went on to play for the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Atlanta Braves, the New York Yankees, the Detroit Tigers and the New York Mets. His 509 career round-trippers rank him 24th All-Time.

Photographs by cstreet.us, thelastminute, turtlemom nancy , fesek, kthypryn, justinwright, sue_elias, pointnshoot, and scrapstothefuture used in background montage under Creative Commons. Thank you.