Jurickson Profar of San Diego Padres has taken road less traveled to first All-Star Game

ARLINGTON, Texas — Jurickson Profar sat at a podium set up on the outfield grass at Globe Life Field, facing the outfield bleachers and a set of windows that looked out across the street at the stadium once known as The Ballpark In Arlington.

It’s about as close as you can get to glancing at your past.

“I grew up in the baseball world, right here,” Profar said Monday afternoon.

“This was home, too.”

At 31, Profar was having a moment so full-circle it might give him whiplash. Twelve years ago, Profar made his major league debut for the Texas Rangers, a 19-year-old batting ninth and staring up at World Series-tested greats like Adrian Beltre, Josh Hamilton and Michael Young.

And there was more than a glimmer that Profar, perhaps, might be greater than all of them.

Signed for a $1.55 million bonus, the Curacao native was, by 2011, ranked by Baseball America as the No. 3 prospect in the South Atlantic League, behind a couple guys named Bryce Harper and Manny Machado.

Harper and Machado have since amassed more than $900 million in salary guarantees and 14 All-Star appearances, their first coming before they could legally drink.

Profar’s first will come Tuesday night. It might get a little misty for him.

He’s now a San Diego Padre, this after being a Ranger and an Athletic and a Rockie and then a Padre again before this year, at an age many have cycled out of the game, re-signed on Feb. 20 almost as an afterthought, with precious few outfielders on the roster.

Yet Profar is proving it’s never too late, not even after a pair of shoulder surgeries cost him two seasons — 2014 and 2015 — that should have fallen in the prime of his early 20s.

He’s more than halfway to what will by far be his finest season. His 14 home runs are already stalking his career high of 20. He is batting .305, 51 points better than his full-season best. His on-base percentage of .394 ranks sixth in the National League, and his .870 OPS is lapping his .793 career high, set in 2018.

After that year, the Rangers traded him to Oakland, a 25-year-old so far removed from the starry expectations trumpeting his debut.

“I didn’t want to get traded,” he said Monday. “But baseball is a business.”

Still, his time in Texas wasn’t all cold-blooded transactions. He has countless friends for life from his time as a Ranger, many of them in town, by happenstance or design, to witness his All-Star turn this week.

Most notably: Beltre, who will throw out the first pitch on Tuesday night and on Sunday get inducted into baseball’s Hall of Fame.

On the field, Profar learned the import of playing every day, “no matter what,” he says, and sure enough, thanks to the Padres’ season-opening series in South Korea, no major leaguer has posted more than Profar, who’s played in 97 of the Padres’ 99 games.

“A lot of things that I learned in baseball early in my career,” says Profar, “is from him.”

Off the field, Profar gleaned the import of family from No. 29, and now Profar has a 6-year-old son and a newborn daughter.

Now, he is the one passing on wisdom, to a generation stunned that this will be his first time jogging out to the baseline, waving to the crowd as he’s announced an All-Star.

“I always thought he was that player,” says Padres center fielder Jackson Merrill, who debuted this season as a 20-year-old and will be in the running for National League Rookie of the Year.

“I always thought he raked and was like this every year. I thought it was normal, but it’s just his first time. He was a really good guy to me. And I really appreciate it.”

Merrill can respect what Profar’s done but perhaps not fully appreciate it. The game comes easy to no one, but stringing good games into good weeks, weeks into months, months in to years is more art than science.

At long last, 15 years after he joined the Rangers, Profar has made it happen. The crowning achievement will come in an appropriate place.

“Just putting everything together. Everything I went through,” he says. “I always had weeks, or one month, of really good playing — defensively, hitting. For a position player, hitting is everything.

“But the experience helps me put it all together. Every day.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Jurickson Profar returns to Texas as All-Star with San Diego Padres