20 Years Later: Joe Mauer and the Fallacy of "What If"

I've been thinking a lot about the year 2004. That's partly because I've begun receiving messages about my 20-year high school reunion. Yep: with the calendar flipping to 2024, it's now been two full decades since I graduated. That's a wild thing to come to grips with. Where did all the time go?!

Of course, 2004 is also top-of-mind because it's when Joe Mauer made his long-awaited major-league debut for the Twins. The start of his major-league career essentially coincided with the start of my adult life. I find it interesting to reflect back on Mauer's baseball journey in parallel with my own, especially as we celebrate news of his coming induction into the Hall of Fame.

Too often, Mauer's playing career was filled with constant ruminations on "what if," rather than a recognition and appreciation of what was. Now, baseball's resounding validation of his accomplishments (with Mauer joining Kirby Puckett and Rod Carew as the only first-ballot Twins in the Hall of Fame) lays bare how misguided that mindset was. There are some good life lessons to be found here, I think.

A Humble Kid with Not-So-Humble Beginnings
Joe Mauer's professional career opened up with an infamous "what if" scenario right out of the gates. Minnesota selected him with the No. 1 overall draft pick in 2001, a decision that was considered controversial at the time with USC ace Mark Prior widely viewed as the best player in the class. (Certainly, he was the closest to making a big-league impact, as he debuted less than a year after the draft.) Terry Ryan's call to go with the hometown high schooler naturally led to a great deal of dissection and second-guessing, especially as Prior rocketed to the majors for the Cubs. 

With the full benefit of hindsight, we can now say that Ryan and the Twins absolutely made the right choice. (It is interesting, though, to contemplate how Prior's presence might have elevated those division-winning Twins teams in 2002 and 2003. Being drafted with the top pick entails sky-high expectations, especially when you're being directly compared to a meteoric pitching prodigy like Prior. Unfazed by all of it, Mauer simply did his thing, immediately overwhelming minor-league pitchers. He quickly established himself as the top prospect in all of baseball, forging a path to the majors that would have him debuting at age 20. 

That set the stage for another round of "what if."

Mauer's Rookie Year: Promise, Then Pain
We arrive in 2004. Following the A.J. Pierzynski trade during the offseason, Mauer is lined up as Minnesota's Opening Day catcher. In his MLB debut, on April 5th, he goes 2-for-3 with a pair of singles and a pair of walks, opening his career in appropriate fashion. The following day, he suffers a meniscus injury in his knee while chasing a pop fly in foul territory. The incident led to surgery, and wound up costing the catcher most of his rookie season--including, crucially, the end. Mauer returned to the field in June, and played extremely well for six weeks (.291/.345/.563, with six homers in 33 games) before ongoing pain and swelling in the knee forced him to shut it down in mid-July.

Ten days after Mauer's season ended, on July 25th, the 2004 Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony was held in Cooperstown. One of the two players honored that day: Paul Molitor, who preceded Mauer as a St. Paul native and Cretin-Derham prep star, turned top draft pick (third overall in 1977), turned eventual Hall of Famer. 

Molitor would later manage Mauer, with both reaching the end of their respective roads in the same year (2018). This intermingling of milestones makes for a fun little wrinkle in our timeline of events here.

Coming Up Short in the ALDS
Despite receiving only 35 total games from their young phenom catcher in 2004, Minnesota won the wimpy AL Central handily (again) and headed for a faceoff against the mighty Yankees in the first round of the playoffs (again). The Twins took Game 1 in New York behind a masterful performance from Johan Santana. Little did we know it'd be the last postseason victory in nearly two decades and, sadly, of Mauer's entire career. 

The rest of that 2004 ALDS was a harrowing thrill ride; they lost Game 2 and Game 4 by one run apiece, in extra innings. If only they had one more premier hitter, capable of delivering a big hit or coaxing a walk in a key moment, it might have made the difference. With no Mauer available, the Twins used two punchless veteran catchers in the series, Henry Blanco and Pat Borders, who combined to go 2-for-10. 

Imagine a healthy rookie Mauer propelling the Twins past the Yankees and onward to face David Ortiz and the fateful Boston Red Sox in the ALCS. Now there's a "what if"!

A Legend in the Making
The following spring, as a freshman in college, I started my Twins blog. The whole concept was relatively new, but I wanted a writing outlet, and my interest in the team was reaching a fever pitch. Mauer had played a major role in it. For someone in my position, how could he not?

I grew up as a contemporary of Joe Mauer. Playing ball in the Twin Cities as a kid and into high school, you couldn't avoid incessantly hearing about the guy. His dynamic multi-sport athleticism. His cannon arm. His perfect swing. Mauer famously struck out once in his entire prep career. There was the time he homered in seven straight games. He batted .605 as a senior. Six-oh-five!

The center of the amateur baseball universe was right in our backyard. It felt surreal. Twins scouting director Mike Radcliff put it perfectly: "The timing of it all is pretty remarkable. To have a kid this talented, from right down the street, enter the draft in the one year we happen to have the top pick — you could never plan that. You couldn’t imagine it."

A storyline too divine to ignore. Just as Mauer entered the fold, I was turning from a kid who liked baseball to an adult who would fully invest himself in fandom. I was hooked for life, and Joe puts a face to that inflection point in my mind.

Appreciating What Was
I started writing regularly about the Twins in the spring of 2005, just as Mauer was getting his career started in earnest, so I had the pleasure of chronicling his entire tenure with the team. I watched him evolve into an All-Star and an MVP. He was one of the biggest stars in the league when the Twins opened their brand-new outdoor stadium, which is now my favorite place in the world. 

As much as people want to wring their hands in hindsight, when Mauer signed his franchise record-shattering $184-million extension in March of 2010, it was a special day for Minnesota baseball. 

"That sound you heard yesterday in the late afternoon? That was the sound of an entire state breathing out one huge sigh of relief," I wrote on my blog at the time. "Yankees fans can stop drooling with anticipation. Red Sox fans can stop formulating theoretical trade packages. Mets fans can let any glimmers of hope die and go back to wallowing in misery. Joe Mauer is staying in Minnesota."

And so he did. All the way up until the end, when he hung up his gear following an emotional sendoff at the ballpark he helped make possible. It was a storybook finish to what we can now fairly summarize as a storybook run.

Moral of the Story
So what have we learned from Mauer's incredible journey, as we look back on the past 20 years leading up this momentous occasion? I'm mostly struck by two big takeaways.

First, he's a perfect counterexample to the notion that nice guys finish last. The descriptor "class act" tends to get overused by fawning media types, but Joe truly embodied it. In the clubhouse, whether you were a team employee, a longtime newspaper columnist, a stadium janitor, or a lowly blogger feeling out of place, Mauer would give you the same treatment: making eye contact while walking by, with a genuine "How ya doing?" 

Nobody who covered or interacted with Mauer got a negative impression of him. His kindness and humility were noticed by all – uncommon for an individual of such talent and fame. We're now seeing the payoff for his gentlemanly ways, as those same people who covered or conversed with Mauer rush to select him on their ballots, despite some of the legitimate statistical question marks attached to his case (shortened prime, lack of playoff accolades, etc.). The contrast is especially compelling as Mauer easily edges other players on the same ballot who are being blocked for their transgressions on or off the field. He did everything the right way, and now he's being rewarded for it.

My other big takeaway comes back to the aforementioned game of "what if." Yeah, we can play it all day with Mauer: What if his power surge from 2009 sustained? What if he could have avoided that career-altering concussion in 2013? What if Phil freaking Cuzzi knew the difference between a fair and foul ball?!

But those "what ifs" can go both ways, and when you get caught up in searching for greener pastures you're liable to miss out on enjoying what's in front of you. Perspective is everything. That's a valuable piece of wisdom I've gained in my 20 years of adulthood, and following Mauer's career throughout that span helped me in developing it.

"As you get older, you learn there are some things out of your control," Mauer said back in 2012. "You learn there's not much you can do but play, and I love to play."

Be a good person, do what you love, and worry about what you can control. The lasting lessons from the legacy of Joe Mauer, a humble, wholesome, and worthy Hall of Famer. Thanks for everything, 7.