On July 25, 1998,  Jesse Orosco pitched in his 1,000th career game in relief for the Baltimore Orioles. The visiting Seattle Mariners won the game 4-2. Orozco pitched a scoreless inning with one strikeout.

Jesse Orosco pitched in an astounding 1252 Major League games in four different decades. No one else has pitched in so many games

Orosco began his 24 year career in 1979 for the Mets. Over nearly a quarter of a century he pitched for the Mets, the Dodgers (on two separate stops), Cleveland, the Brewers, the Orioles, the Padres, the Yankees, and finally the Minnesota Twins in 2003.

Looking at his Baseball Reference page, you can see that the lefty was a key component to the Mets’ 1986 World Series season as well as to a number of other playoff teams over the years.

Orosco finished his career in 2003 playing for the Twins who went 90-72 that year– finishing first, four games ahead of the White Sox. Orosco appeared in just 8 games that year.

What I remember most about Orosco and that year is that when he retired from baseball in 2003, there were no longer any players in the Major League Baseball that were older than me. (Jesse had been born in 1957, three years before me). At 43, I no longer had an MLB player older than me to look up to anymore. The circle of life.