Catcher recalls protest
black community in the East Bay and for donating $100,000 to the Oakland African American Chamber of Commerce, the Oakland NAACP, and 100 Black Men of the Bay Area this week.
“The difference now is everyone is hopping on board, the athletes, the people supporting how Colin Kaepernick did his thing, some people are supporting how I did my thing,” Maxwell said. “We did it in a peaceful manner and the purpose is now being seen as genuine, a legitimate problem in America.
“But where was this three years ago? Where was this when Kaepernick lost his career and still kept pushing? Where were these people when I took a knee? ... Where was this support when I was pushed out of MLB and it was made to seem it was because I was arrested and what I was arrested for wasn’t even illegal?”
Maxwell’s arrest, an incident he has discussed little since he was charged with assault with a deadly weapon in Scottsdale, Ariz., in October 2017, came after he opened the door to a fooddelivery person with a gun in his hand. Many people have seen the video of Maxwell, shirtless, drunkenly berating police officers, but Maxwell said few know what really happened, or why he’d open a door holding a gun.
In the aftermath of his protest, Maxwell dealt with a number of death threats, including some disturbingly specific threats against his family; one threatened to blow up his sister’s gym in Texas. Others called his mother profane names for her biracial marriage and children. “People threatened to hang me, threatened to burn my house down. They said they hope I died in a house fire or lived with thirddegree burns,” Maxwell said. “It was the most atrocious stuff I’ve ever heard in my life, and I’ve never understood why there is so much hatred for a pursuit of equality.”
Maxwell was on high alert as a result, and when his doorbell rang unexpectedly, he grabbed his gun out of its safe, he said. “I never raised my weapon but I did frighten the woman at my door because I had a weapon — I would have been frightened as well,” he said. “As soon as I recognized it was a woman, I apologized and walked back to my living room and put my gun back in my safe. I walked back to the door, apologized again, and she handed me the food one of my friends had ordered and she went on her way.
“Moments later, I get a call from the police and I had numerous cops at my house. They were pointing rifles at me when I walked out of my door like I had killed 30 people and hid the bodies in my apartment.”
Maxwell said police wouldn’t allow him to get shoes or a shirt, and he says the police video obtained by TMZ was edited to make him look bad.
“People think they know the story. They say, ‘Oh, he beat this lady. He threatened to shoot this lady.’ I didn’t do any of that,” he said. “I was protecting my house. I didn’t do anything illegal. I was intoxicated but I was in my own home. I wasn’t in a great state of mind because of what was going on at that time, but people want to label me a thug for that.
“I was loud and obnoxious and I will own it. That’s what I pleaded to — I have a plea for disorderly conduct, which is the same if you were drunk outside a bar and p—ing on the building. People have used that to call me a criminal when the original exaggerated charge couldn’t be proven because it did not happen. No one can let that go, which is OK, but the same people who can’t let that go don’t need to be posting ‘Black Lives Matter’ because those people are hypocrites.”
The A’s remained supportive throughout Maxwell’s troubles that winter and told him the catcher job was his the following season. He came into camp overweight, which didn’t go over well, and the team signed Jonathan Lucroy to be the everyday catcher. Maxwell’s atbats dried up and he eventually was demoted. Late in the season, he refused an assignment, and since then, he has drawn little interest. Some believe that’s because of his protest during the anthem, some point to the arrest and the video, and others believe it’s largely because Maxwell’s production dipped.
Whatever the case, at a position where most teams have need of some experience, Maxwell was not considered an option, and he spent last year with Monclova in the Mexican League, helping the team win its firstever title. With play in Mexico potentially starting Aug. 7, he’s not thinking much about the major leagues.
“At the end of the day, I’m here. My job is to help my team here, and that’s what I’m focused on,” he said. “I vow to worry about today and not tomorrow. If the scouts see me, good, whatever. I’m no longer playing because I hope to get back, but because these guys rely on me and this city trusts me to deliver.”