Is Milledge the next Devo?

Remember Mike Devereaux? A 5th round draft pick of the Dodgers out of Arizona State in the June 1985 amateur draft, he was traded to Baltimore for journeyman pitcher Mike Morgan just prior to the 1989 season. Devo was roughly the same size as Milledge — six feet tall and about 190 pounds — with plus foot speed and a little pop in his bat. He was immediately installed as the Orioles’ everyday center fielder, and responded by hitting .266 with 8 home runs, 46 RBI and 22 stolen bases. Not eye-popping, but acceptable for a team that had lost 107 games the previous year.

Devereaux’s big league output would peak in 1992, the year that Camden Yards opened. He batted .276 with 24 home runs and 107 RBI, and finished seventh in American League MVP voting. At 29, he looked like a genuine star on the rise.

A funny thing happened, though. He never again approached those numbers. His stolen base total declined precipitously over his time with the O’s, going from 22 to 13 to 16 to 10 to 3 to 1, before he left Baltimoreto sign with the White Sox just prior to the 1995 season. If you look at his caught stealing numbers, you’ll see that, for a guy who could really put-’em-down-and-pick-’em-up, his success rate was pretty dismal: 85 career steals with 56 caught stealing. His home run totals sagged as well.

Here’s the thing about Devo: Any scout or baseball scribe from that era will tell you that Mike was a terrific athlete — with very  few baseball instincts. Oh, sure, he could run fast — but that doesn’t make you a good base stealer. He could run down about anything that was hit his way in center field, but he didn’t always catch it. He swung at a lot of bad pitches. Any of that sound vaguely familiar?

Milledge was a first round draft pick — the 12th pick overall — in the 2003 draft. The scouts loved this kid’s athleticism. He was continuously lauded by various baseball publications and Web sites as one of the top 2 or 3 prospects in the game. When the Nats acquired him from the Mets last winter, I was among those who praised the deal effusively. I thought it was an absolute steal.

It still may be just that, but we really won’t know for another two-to-three seasons. Milledge played only 307 minor league games in the New York farm system, beginning when he was just out of high school, while Devereaux came out of a college baseball factory at ASU. Lastings never really dominated on any level of the minors. He hit only 34 home runs in the minor leagues, and committed 21 errors, 18 of those in center field. Still, the Mets brought him up for long looks in 2006 and 2007, and the “outstanding athleticism” label stuck. Great baseball instincts? Not so much.

Shakespeare (or maybe Don King) once wrote that “some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them.” Milledge doesn’t quite qualify for the first count, and the third isn’t at all his fault. He’s still got time to grab the second rung, but I doubt a Devereaux-like career will satisfy the Nats or their fans.

Hear Phil Wood Saturdays at 10 a.m. on SportsTalk 980 AM and is a contributor to Nats Xtra on MASN. Contact him at [email protected].