Hot Stove Update: Padres Trade for Cameron Maybin

The Padres and Marlins completed a trade today with the Padres acquiring CF Cameron Maybin for 2 RP's, Ryan Webb and Edward Mujica

The Padres have been looking for a speedy OF to patrol the vast domain of Petco Park for some time. Tony Gwynn Jr has the speed to track down drives in the alleys, but has no bat whatsoever. Other guys who can hit don't quite have the speed or chops to play CF, especially in that park. Maybin has been a much anticipated prospect for seemingly as long as I can remember.

Originally drafted into the Detroit Tigers organization, Maybin put up an intriguing combination of near- .400 OBP's and 25+ SB's in the lower minors that made prospect watchers drool. His power numbers, while never great, seemed to be good enough to keep pitchers honest and help him maintain his OBP. Maybin's detractors pointed to his consistently extreme groundball rates and worried that his power would never develop and his BA might not hold up at higher levels where the fielding was better.

Maybin was traded to Florida when the Tigers acquired Miggy Cabrera. Maybin got a late callup in 2008 at performed well in a very small sample size. He was penciled in as Florida's starting CF in 2009, but flopped and was sent back to the minors. He stayed up for good last year, but only achieved a slash line of .234/.302/.361 with 8 HR's and 9 SB's in 315 PA's over 82 games. He was rapidly becoming the odd man out in Florida's OF with the emergence of Mike Stanton, Logan Morrison, Chris Coghlan and Scott Cousins, so was expendable to the Marlins.

Florida's bullpen was a shambles last year and needed a serious upgrade. The Marlins achieved a big part of that goal in one trade by acquiring two hard throwing RHP's who were part of San Diego's seemingly endless parade of flame-throwers out of their bullpen last year. San Diego obviously felt they had enough pitching depth to use some of it to fill a nagging need.

I'm going to give the thumbs up on this trade to Florida and a thumbs down to San Diego. Maybin's slightly negative UZR from 2010 would suggest that he may not be the CF answer in Petco and the other spacious OF's in the NL West. He continues to have an extreme GB tendency which will limit his power potential which is likely to be non-existent playing in the NL West anyway. Yes, some of those ground balls will go on through for base-hits, but MLB fielders will turn the vast majority of them into outs. San Diego may be able to replace Webb and Mujica in the bullpen, but more likely their depth will be adversely affected turning their greatest strength into merely good.

Florida obviously improves here giving up their 5'th OF at best while creating instant respectability for their tattered bullpen.