A native of the St. Louis suburb of Granite City, Illinois, Maxvill played baseball in high school, then attended Washington University where he earned a degree in electrical engineering. He signed his first professional baseball contract in 1960 with the hometown St. Louis Cardinals.\n', '

Maxvill appeared in 1,423 regular-season games for the Cardinals (1962–72), Oakland Athletics (1972–73; 1974–75) and Pittsburgh Pirates (1973–74). He batted and threw right-handed. A smooth fielder but notoriously weak hitter, Maxvill set a number of dubious hitting records in his career. He batted .217 with just six home runs in 3,989 plate appearances over his 14-year major league career. Due to the position he played – and the effectiveness with which he fielded – he was also the beneficiary of the convention that shortstops generally do not need to hit as well as other positions for their skills to be considered assets as Major League players.\n', '

Maxvill\'s best season with the bat was 1968 with the Cardinals. He set career highs in batting average (.253), on-base percentage (.329), and slugging percentage (.298). He also received his only Most Valuable Player award votes (finishing in twentieth place) and won his only Gold Glove. Ironically, as the rest of baseball\'s pitching became more dominant and hitting trended downward that year, Maxvill\'s hitting trended upward. In the "Year of the Pitcher," he benefited in part from not having to bat against teammate Bob Gibson, who set the modern-day record for earned run average (ERA) at 1.12, or the rest of the Cardinal\'s pitching staff, which led the Major Leagues in ERA at 2.49.\n', '

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