As part of our new set of features, every Saturday we will examine a ‘what if’ scenario that pits sports history against imagination. It could be anything from improbable championship runs to player movement.

What if Randy Johnson would have stayed with the Montreal Expos? The Big Unit is about as sure fire of a hall of famer as it gets and has had an illustrious 19 year career with the Mariners, Diamondbacks, Yankees, and yes, the Montreal Expos. Unit was drafted by the Expos out of USC. He made his debut with the team in 1988 but his stay with the Expos was hardly extensive. The wild child was traded from the Expos to the Mariners in 1989 for Mark Langston, a move that only kept Langston in Expos blue until the end of the season before he went on to California to play for the Angels. Great trade? Not so much. I’d catergorize it as awful.

Say Expos management wasn’t walking around with their heads up their asses. Say Langston, who to his credit was good at the time, hadn’t been dealt and the Expos had stuck with the hard throwing and often wild Johnson. We may have been looking at one of the best rotations in the National League. Chew on this. Randy Johnson (who would win a CY Young in 1995) is the number one starter. Pedro Martinez, who won a CY Young for the Expos in 1997 and was part of that unbelieveable 1994 team, would have been the number two starter. And throw in Ken Hill who posted 16 win seasons in both 1992 and 1994 and Jeff Fassero (yes, I just did a Jeff Fassero name drop on you) into the mix after he came up with the Expos in ‘91, and you would have had a pretty solid front end of the rotation. Would it have rivaled the Braves headliners? Maybe. Who’s to say that it couldn’t have been as good.

Now that we have Randy Johnson throwing 99 for us at the ripe age of his early 20’s and a young Pedro Martinez dealing as well, we can move on to the lineup portion. Larry Walker is a name that comes to mind, as does Cliff Floyd, Moises Alou, and Marquis Grissom. Walker left via free agency to sign with the Rockies in 1995, but I think if he would have had Johnson on the team, the incentive would have been better than what it was (only a young Pedro). Grissom was dealt after the ‘94 season as well because of financial reasons to the Braves for a sack of marbles and Tony Tarasco. Because this is the ‘what if’ game, I’m throwing finances out the window. Grissom stays because the Expos struck Canadian gold and steals 30+ bases and plays an insane defensive center field. Moises Alou’s progression as a player continues and hitting .300 becomes something he can do in his sleep.

What if Randy Johnson would have remained an Expo? The Mariners surely wouldn’t have been the championship caliber team that they were in the mid-90’s. The Expos might have been something special instead of something to laugh about. Maybe if Unit would have stayed, Expos games would out-draw Yonne concerts. Maybe.