TORONTO — Three weeks after the day that forever changed their lives, the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School baseball team took the field in Jacksonville, Florida, for a tournament.
The Eagles arrived with a motorcade escorting their team bus through the streets to the stadium. As they disembarked, fans held signs of support. A push to sell out the park raised money for the high school. The players all wore No. 17 that day — for the 17 people whose futures were shattered in an instant.
It was March 9, 2018. Twenty-three days earlier, a gunman had entered the Parkland, Florida, high school and murdered 14 students and three teachers and injured 17 others.
Coby Mayo survived.
The Orioles infield prospect was a sophomore at the time, and in the years since the fallout of that day sticks with him. He can look back with fondness on the reception he and his teammates received in Jacksonville. He was always motivated, but his dedication to live out his dream of reaching the major leagues only increased because his classmates’ dreams became unobtainable. When Mayo was drafted by the Orioles in 2020, he wore a hat with #MSDStrong stitched on it, and the slogan carries weight for Mayo.
Strong.
Read More
“You want to be that person who gets stronger from this,” Mayo said. “You want to be someone who comes out better.”
Mayo had a choice in the days and weeks and months following one of the worst school shootings in American history. He chose to move forward — not to forget but to overcome.
In many ways, the tragedy shaped Mayo’s future.
When Mayo arrives at Tropicana Field on Friday for Baltimore’s series opener against the Tampa Bay Rays, it will be the first time he returns to his home state as a major leaguer. He expects scores of family and friends to make the trip, which is about a four-hour drive from Parkland, over the course of the weekend.
“I wanted to be in the big leagues my whole life, and that kind of gave me a little extra motivation to make it,” Mayo said. “I’ve always said I want to play for the city and the victims and the families.”
Mayo declines to talk about the day of the shooting itself, Feb. 14, 2018. He prefers to focus on what came next — the rallying of the town, the vigils, the increased safety protocols at schools. And baseball.
On that field in Jacksonville, less than a month after the shooting, Mayo witnessed that strength comes in community. Florida united around his teammates, and his teammates united around each other.
They played baseball, because that’s what they knew.
“No one really liked being alone. No one wanted to spend time in your room doing nothing,” Mayo said. “Being at the field and being with each other … baseball’s everyone’s kind of safe place.”
The sport gave Mayo and his teammates an outlet during the darkest period of their lives, and baseball continues to be Mayo’s passion. He was selected in the fourth round of the 2020 MLB draft by the Orioles out of high school after posting gaudy batting numbers, and he continued that success in the minors.
Before receiving a call-up to the majors this month — becoming the first member of that star-studded 2018 high school team to arrive — Mayo was hitting .301 with a .961 on-base-plus-slugging percentage in Triple-A Norfolk. The 22-year-old is still searching for his first major league base knock through five games, but there’s little surprise Mayo is going through a learning curve. It happens to most highly touted prospects.
“I think the students of the school, the teachers, families, you grow up a little bit quicker, and you realize life’s short, and you want to put everything you can into it when you have the opportunity.”
Coby Mayo
He could record his first hit in his home state this weekend in front of friends and family. It would be poignant doing it close to home, in front of a community that banded together six years ago.
“A lot of baseball guys had some really good friends who lost their lives, and to this day, all those guys who are still playing, they always play in honor of the 17 that lost their lives that day,” said Todd Fitz-Gerald, who coached Mayo at Marjory Stoneman Douglas. “I know he’s always playing for Parkland, playing for the school, playing for those people. That’s just who he is as a person, though. Always been really humble.”
Mayo is still a presence in the community. His parents live near the high school, and every offseason Mayo returns to train at his old field with Fitz-Gerald and the current crop of baseball players.
On his drive to the field each day, he would see the old school building where 14 of his classmates and three teachers died. The building was untouched since 2018, preserving the crime scene while trials continued.
Each time, Mayo felt mixed emotions. There were positive memories made at that high school. But seeing the freshman building, as it was called, was a sharp reminder of the pain and suffering that occurred on Feb. 14, 2018.
In June, the building was demolished. Mayo said it was a “long time coming,” and he’s glad “to know all of that is put away and families don’t really have to see that building anymore.”
The memory won’t leave, however, no matter how many years pass or whether the building still stands. He doesn’t want it to, either. The pain of that day changed Mayo, and, if anything, it only made him chase a major league dream more fervently.
“I think the students of the school, the teachers, families, you grow up a little bit quicker,” Mayo said, “and you realize life’s short, and you want to put everything you can into it when you have the opportunity.”
He missed birthday parties and sleepovers growing up, traveling with his parents across Florida to baseball tournaments. He returned to the field three weeks after the shooting and found solace with a bat in his hands.
The years have passed and his classmates have scattered — to jobs, to college, to Major League Baseball. But they all carry the same distinction. They are survivors, and they’re living for those who were not.
“Time passes, and time heals all things,” Mayo said. “But you never forget it. You’re always going to know that.”
