Before it gets too far behind me and I forget about it, the great J.J. Cooper, Editor-in-Chief for Baseball America, posted a fascinating study earlier this week on the changing age demographics of major league baseball players. While the common perception is that teams are pushing players to the majors at ever younger ages, the actual truth is completely the opposite, and that’s true whether you look at the outliers or the average player. Teenaged position players making their debuts — which used to be a fairly standard part of the MLB landscape — have all but vanished, with Juan Soto being the only one in the last decade. The age of MLB’s youngest player has been on a steady rise over my lifetime, and is now, on average, close to 21 years old. Even more remarkable has been the climb of the average debut age of all players, which has now pushed up past the age of 25 — remarkably close to peak production years, which are generally considered to start at 26.
Cooper’s point with his data is that it’s driving overall payroll expenditures down, since most players are now hitting free agency in their 30s, while when the system was originally set up, it was still fairly common for free agents to be in their 20s. For our purposes, this is yet another data point that makes us recalculate what exactly constitutes “age appropriate” in the minor league levels. It’s a fascinating article that I highly recommend reading (and, of course, I always recommend anyone interested in prospects to have a BA subscription!).
Now on with our regularly scheduled show! Did I just say that Brett Wisely hadn’t been hitting the ball particularly hard so far this year, despite his hot start? Well, allow Mr. Wisely to retort:
That was just part of what turned out to be a very special night for Wisely and the Cats in Sacramento.
HITTER of the DAY: Brett Wisely (Sac), 2 for 4, 2 HR (4), 2 R, 3 RBI, 1 BB
PITCHER of the NIGHT: Hayden Wynja (Eug), 5.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 K
Let’s head to the Minor Lines…
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