Negative records: the humbling side of baseball: unflattering marks remind players about the degree of difficulty the game takes on at the major league level.

A NOTABLE WIT WROTE: "THERE IS only one thing in the world worse than being remembered, and that is not being remembered."

It's something all ballplayers should think about in mid-career, and a few possibly do with regret in vain once their playing days are over and they fade into the anonymity of private life. But then it's too late for the vast majority of players, the spear-carriers who neither flaunted Hall of Fame credentials nor achieved isolated memorable feats in otherwise unremarkable careers.

Fortunately, even futility and failure can earn what passes for "immortality" in baseball terms, inclusion in the record books. The "worst" as well as the ...