One Night Only: Your Guide to This Evening in Baseball

If I’ve learned one lesson from my life on the streets, it’s that I’m not so special. It’s not a pleasant revelation, this. Though I’m neither a psychologist, nor do I even play one on TV, I feel totally comfortable stating publicly that “feeling special” is probably pretty high up there on the list of things humans want/need. Even so, there is one distinct benefit of this difficult news, and it’s this: if ever I have an idea, I can bet that someone else has probably had it, too.

So when I thought to myself recently, “Hey, you know what’d be cool? If there were a daily preview thing at FanGraphs” — well, the only reasonable conclusion I was able to draw is that probably about a gabillion other people have thought the same thing*.

*One of these gabillion people actually turns out to be FanGraphs contributor and Unbearable Math Snob Jack Moore, who will — I joke you not — be previewing the Sox/Rays Patriots’ Day game in these electronic pages roughly one hour from now.

With that, I present to you here the first installment of something I think I’ll call “One Night Only.” The idea isn’t necessarily to provide a complete statistical primer for a single game — and it’s definitely not to “predict” the day’s winners or any specific performances or anything like that. Rather, the idea is to identify a game or games or I-don’t-know-what about the day in baseball that might be of interest to the curious fan.

Will this be a daily venture? Oh God, no. As a cardholding layabout, I’m expressly forbidden from putting forth the kind of effort that such an undertaking would require. But I think it’s something that might happen more than once a week. That sounds reasonable for the time being.

Of course, the form could change drastically and without notice. For the time being, however, it’ll probably look a lot like this:

Rockies (Aaron Cook) at Nationals (Craig Stammen), 7:05 ET
While frequently a great pitching matchup is the main draw for a game, such is not the case here. Craig Stammen is an exercise in meh-dom. Aaron Cook is slightly more interesting — not only for his groundballing ways but for the increased whiff rate he’s posted on the early season (9.3% currently versus 5.9% career). Still, Cook is mostly a known quantity, and it’s not the most exciting quantity on the block.

So what’s there to see here?, maybe you’re asking.

Justin Maxwell, is the answer.

Maxwell turns 27 later this year, but between his five-tool profile, decent plate discipline, and injury-plagued minor league career, still has prospect status. He’s listed at 6-5/235 — which, by comparison, is an inch taller and 15 pounds heavier than the very menacing Jason Heyward. (Note: I actually don’t know whether it’s Heyward’s size or his scary robot sunglasses that makes him so frightening. I must research this further.)

In 137 career plate appearances — eight of which have come in the last four or so days — Maxwell has posted a line of .250/.336/.475, good for a 120 wRC+. That’s decent stuff, and not entirely shocking given his minor league numbers.

All in all, between his athleticism and contact issues, Maxwell probably figures to become the poorest man’s Mike Cameron. It’s possible that his defense is comparable. CHONE doesn’t like him this year, pitting him below average, but Baseball America (per this year’s Prospect Handbook) rates him Maxwell as “an above-average defender in center field with excellent range and instincts.”

One problem: there’s no guarantee Maxwell’s gonna play today. He’s not in a strict platoon with Willie Harris in Washington’s wide open right field, but it’s platoon-ish. That’s fair. Maybe Ubaldo Jimenez can just find some way to throw another no-hitter.