Mendoza spent 13 seasons in Minor League Baseball. He joined the coaching staff of the Staten Island Yankees in the Yankees Minor League system for the 2009 season before joining the Charleston RiverDogs in 2010.
He was the manager of the Gulf Coast League Yankees for the 2011 season. Before the 2012 season, he returned to the RiverDogs as their manager. After the 2012 season, he joined the Yankees’ organization as a roving defensive instructor.
Mendoza was promoted to infield coach for the Yankees’ major league team after the 2017 season.
Despite only playing outfield during his career, Mendoza has been praised as a team leader on and off the field, being hired as an infield instructor.
Why do they call it the Mendoza Line?
The Mendoza Line was a term coined by a colleague of Mario Mendoza’s on the 1979 Mariners — commonly credited to Tom Paciorek or Bruce Bochte — as a joke on the light-hitting shortstop, who had a lifetime batting average of. 200 (though he really finished with a career batting average of.