The Former Franchise: Cameron Maybin
The previous weekend represented a potential landmark moment for one of Major League Baseball’s most stereotypically downtrodden franchises. A city used to seeing homegrown stars leave for greener pastures, where season-long disappointment seems as natural as the empty seats that populate the stadium.
But for this franchise, hope runs anew. Before the ink was dry, team management announced that their star centerfielder was going to stay in town for at least five more years. The former first round pick in 2005 had impressed enough people that those in charge decided his mug would be the new face of the franchise. The fans had long hoped that one day their team would have a potential superstar to promote outside their beautiful ballpark. Now they do.
Of course, I’m talking about the San Diego Padres and their decision to give Cameron Maybin a five-year, $25-million contract. (What, did you think I was talking about Andrew McCutchen? In the business, we call that “misdirection.” Or lazy storytelling.)
For Maybin, this represents the first real commitment to what was once a sure-fire superstar career. The 10th-overall pick in 2005, Maybin came out of high school with comparisons to Ken Griffey Jr.
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High praise if there ever was such a thing, but as long as one didn’t actually believe Maybin would hit 600+ home runs in his career and star in the greatest baseball game ever created, there were reasons to believe the comparisons. Speed, flair, charisma and the ability to cover most of the outfield, Maybin was pegged to be a future Detroit cornerstone. However, Tiger management decided that future wasn’t going to come soon enough, and before his 21st birthday Maybin was dealt to Florida, one of the centerpieces (along with Andrew Miller) that brought Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis to Detroit. Obviously expectations were high for Maybin; teams don’t give up two perennial All-Stars for nothing. But if you ask Marlin fans now, many will assume they got just that.
Tumultuous would be a good phrase to describe Maybin’s tenure with Florida. He bounced back and forth from the Majors to Triple-A, always doing well enough in the minors to justify a trip to the big leagues, but never being consistent enough to justify staying. It got to the point where Maybin was afraid of failing because of the ever-looming threat of heading back to the bus-rides.
“I was a little out of place in Florida,” Maybin told the San Diego Union Tribune when he was first traded. “I was a runner on a station-to-station team. I can’t say that I didn’t get a chance. But I didn’t really get a chance to do my thing.”
In 144 games over three years with the Marlins, Maybin posted a line of .257/.323/.391, and never gained too much favor with those in charge. He was still young and had shown flashes of what made him a Top-10 pick in the first place, but impatience was growing and other young Marlin talents, like Hanley Ramirez and Mike Stanton, were showing their worth in the majors much earlier in their careers than Maybin could. It was because of their progress (and an incredibly unhealthy and broken Marlin bullpen that needed fixing) that the Marlins, who had given up so much to get Maybin in the first place, dealt him cross country for a pair of mid-level bullpen arms in Edward Mujica and Ryan Webb.
Those two names could turn out to be quite famous in Florida baseball folklore. The Padres dealt those two arms to the Marlins to acquire Maybin. San Diego needed a fresh face with the seemingly inevitable trade of Adrian Gonzalez (Maybin was picked up November 2010, Gonzalez was dealt a month later). In the Padre organization, there was no one pushing Maybin, no desire to send him to the minors. From day one, Cameron was pegged to be the everyday starter in the vast cavern that is centerfield at PETCO Park. It was believed his speed, athleticism and non-reliance on a power game would fit well in San Diego; that belief ended up being true.
In his first year as a Padre, Maybin hit .264/.323/.393, stole 40 bases and scored 82 runs; it was nothing spectacular but was a definite improvement from his time in Florida. His defense was rock-solid, providing an unofficial average of one web-gem per week. He became the best all-around centerfielder San Diego had trotted out since Steve Finley patrolled Jack Murphy Field in the late-90s. He was incredible yet inconsistent, speedy yet streaky, a fan-favorite and occasionally frustrating. But at 24 and performing in his first full season as a bona fide major leaguer, it was all that San Diego could have reasonably hoped for. At the end of the year he was named the Team MVP. Last week he was given his first big money contract.
Players fail to live up to contract obligations all the time, and there’s a fair chance that will happen with Maybin (and with McCutchen). But for someone like Maybin, a former can’t-miss prospect who drew comparisons to Griffey and ended up being traded twice before his 24th birthday, the contract is the first major commitment to his skills in his professional career. Coming from a team like San Diego, where long-term deals are offered with the same frequency of sightings of Haley’s Comet, it’s an even larger testament to Maybin’s skill set and what San Diego not only hopes – but expects from its newest face of the franchise.
Cameron Maybin will be considered a “bust” no more. He’s the centerpiece of an up-and-coming team looking to shed a few unflattering labels about the franchise. Maybin is right where he was expected to be; it just took him a bit longer than he may have hoped.
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