Adam Dunn is now three years removed from his historic cratering to a 54 OPS+ in 2011. Since then, he has compiled almost as many strikeouts as total bases, but has still managed a modestly respectable 112 OPS+ with a nice total of 80 home runs and almost 200 RBI.

That one season of 54 OPS+ is the only time in Dunn’s 14-year career that he’s finished south of 100. While nobody else can say that about an OPS+ season in the 50s, other players have turned in truly dreadful campaigns the only time they’ve been below 100 OPS+. More after the jump on the very worst single seasons in otherwise consistently good careers.

For this analysis, I first identified all players with at least 10 seasons of 400+ PA. I reduced that list to include only those players with exactly one 400 PA season of OPS+ below 100. Finally, I selected the worst of those single seasons below 100 OPS+, being all of those seasons with OPS+ below 80. Here they are:

My hunch starting this was that I would see a lot of seasons early and late in a career. And there are those, but also quite a number of players like Dunn who cratered mid-career and managed to recover, at least to some degree.

Early Reverses

In this group are Roy Sievers, Joe Adcock, Lou Whitaker and Mike Cameron.

Roy Sievers‘ season was his second after winning RoY honors batting .308 with 16 HR, 91 RBI. That precipitous decline reduced Sievers to a part-time role, with just 453 PA and 88 OPS+ over the Browns’ final 3 years in St. Louis. With a fresh start in Baltimore, the Orioles botched one of their first moves, trading Sievers to Washington for Gil Coan, a light-hitting 32 year-old outfielder with just 3.3 career WAR in eight seasons as a Senator.

Joe Adcock‘s season was his second as a Red, and second under 100 OPS+, after posting 97 in 398 PA in his rookie campaign. To its credit, Cincinnati stuck with Adcock, only not long enough. Adcock started showing his form the next year, raising his BA and OBP each by 30+ points, and his SLG by 80 points. But, it wasn’t enough to keep Adcock out of a complicated 4-team off-season trade that turned out for the Reds as Adcock for Rocky Bridges and cash. Not Cincinnati’s most brilliant maneuver.

Lou Whitaker‘s season was his third as a Tiger regular, after 8.3 WAR over his first two years, including an RoY award. The Tigers of the 1960s and 1970s were known for hanging on to their young talent. That trait held true in this instance, to the Tigers’ great advantage over the next 15 seasons.

Mike Cameron‘s season was his second, after finishing 6th in RoY voting the year before. But, the White Sox figured they’d seen enough and sent him to the Reds for a young guy with a funny name, one Paul Konerko. Over their careers since then (1999), Cameron has out-WARed Konerko, by 40.6 to 30.1. But, Cincinnati only saw a glimpse of that, sending Cameron to Seattle the next season for Ken Griffey, who provided only 12.7 WAR for the Reds.

Late Lament

In this group are Jim Bottomley, George McQuinn and Ken Singleton.

Jim Bottomley was done and the Reds knew it, shipping the former Cardinal to the sad-sack Browns, and a reunion with manager Rogers Hornsby. Bottomley squeaked out a 101 OPS+ the next year, and then part-time duty in one final season.

George McQuinn looked like he was done, but wasn’t. After one disastrous season as an Athletic, the former Browns’ star landed on his feet in the Bronx where he posted 4.4 WAR as first baseman for the 1947 world champs.

Ken Singleton was done and everybody knew it. Last season for the Orioles’ star, after 10 years, 30 WAR and a world championship in Baltimore.

Mid-Career Meltdowns

This group, of course, is everybody else.

Jim Wynn‘s decline was as spectacular as it was sudden, coming after four seasons (age 25-28) averaging 150 OPS+. The Astros stuck with their star who rewarded them with a bounce-back 1972 campaign of 146 OPS+. But a 1973 slide to .220/.347/.395 resulted in Houston shipping the 31 year-old to the Dodgers, where he rebounded again to 7.7 WAR as LA claimed the NL pennant. Wynn had one more good season (4.8 WAR) with the Dodgers and an okay year (2.7 WAR) in Atlanta, before finishing up with part-time duty for the Yankees and Brewers.

Defending and 4-time batting champion Bill Madlock started slowly in 1984, then had a decent May (.298/.353/.330), but could never get on a roll after that, before his season was cut short by injury early in August. Madlock would have 3 more replacement level-type seasons for 3 teams, with OPS+ clear of 100, but totaling only 4.5 WAR.

Mike Lowell survived the Marlins’ post-World Series sell-off, but couldn’t survive his 2005 dud of a season, being dealt with Josh Beckett to the Red Sox, where both would figure prominently for the world champions of two seasons hence. But the Marlins know their ballplayers, fleecing Boston of two young stars (Hanley Ramirez and Annibal Sanchez) who would be fixtures with the Fish for the next 6 seasons.

And, then there was Adam Dunn‘s much documented cliff dive to .159/.292/.277. The one bright spot of that darkest season was the middle number in that slash, made possible by Dunn’s 75 walks, a rather remarkable total for someone with Dunn’s batting average. Dunn flirted with the Mendoza line again in 2012, but his 105 walks and 41 dingers made up for 222 whiffs. More of the same in 2013, and then his best April since 2009 this year. Dunn may yet drop out of this group with another sub-100 OPS+ season, but he has recovered from his dance with doom.

Honorable Mention

A couple of others worthy of mention who fit the bill except for a disqualifying season of 99 OPS+, the second under the 100 mark.

The Giants were riding high at 30-15 when they acquired veteran Tony Cuccinello from the Bees midway in the 1940 season. Cuccinello was batting .270 when New York grabbed him, an apparent perfect fit to fill a hole at second base where rookie Al Glossop was struggling with the bat. Instead, joining a general team collapse, Cuccinello posted a 50 OPS+ the rest of the 1940 season as the Giants tumbled to a 42-65 finish. The next year was spent toiling in Jersey City before New York gave “Cooch” his outright release. Three wartime seasons totaling only 393 PA and .233/.298/.289 hardly seemed like a harbinger for Cuccinello’s final act, a 3.1 WAR campaign at age 37 for the 1945 White Sox, the first of only four players (the others are Ted Williams, Roberto Clemente and Barry Bonds) with a farewell age 37+ season of 3 WAR and 125 OPS+.

After two years of military service, 31 year-old Joe Gordon‘s 1946 return to the Yankees was unfortunately marred by a succession of injuries that kept him out the lineup for short periods throughout the season. Result: 79 OPS+, benching in September, and a ticket to Cleveland in the off-season. Gordon returned to his All-Star form with the Indians, posting 17.6 WAR for 1947-49, including a 1948 world championship season during which he raked at .304/.412/.600 for September as Cleveland edged out the Yankees and Red Sox to take the pennant. Revenge is sweet!