Fansided

MLB: 8 of baseball’s most infamous one-year wonders

By Ryan Morik

DETROIT - SEPTEMBER 3: Joel Zumaya #54 of the Detroit Tigers pitches against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim on September 3, 2006 at Comerica Park in Detroit, Michigan. Los Angeles won the game 2-1. (Photo By Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)
DETROIT - SEPTEMBER 3: Joel Zumaya #54 of the Detroit Tigers pitches against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim on September 3, 2006 at Comerica Park in Detroit, Michigan. Los Angeles won the game 2-1. (Photo By Gregory Shamus/Getty Images) /
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Kevin Maas of the New York Yankees in action during a game at Yankee Stadium in Bronx, New York.
Kevin Maas of the New York Yankees in action during a game at Yankee Stadium in Bronx, New York. /

Kevin Maas

.252/.367/.902, 21 home runs, 41 RBI, 2nd place in AL Rookie of the Year voting in 1990

This name probably sounds familiar to you. That’s probably because every time you see a power hitting rookie take over the league, you automatically hope he isn’t this guy.

Don’t lie, you heard Kevin Maas’ name a lot last season as Pete Alonso rewrote history books. You definitely heard it in 2017 when Aaron Judge went from the AL MVP favorite to hitting .217 in a stretch of 80 games. It seemed like the perfect comparison, as Maas was a Yankee, like Judge.

Maas averaged a home run every 14.3 plate appearances during the 1990 season, hitting 21 in 79 big-league games, and was supposed to be the power-hitter that the Yankees needed in the tail end of Don Mattingly’s career. But in 1991, his first full season, he only hit two more home runs (23) than the year prior, and owned just a .713 OPS for the rest of his career.

Maas tried a major league comeback, and played in the minors from 1995 to 1997. He even played 63 games in Japan. But his last big league appearance was in 1995 as a Minnesota Twin. He hit just .193 that season, and hit just one home run in 32 games in his final MLB season.

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