"I've been alive for a billion data points and I haven't died once."
July 3, 2018 8:34 AM   Subscribe

In this month's Body Issue of ESPN the Magazine, Sam Miller looks at the physiology of maturation and aging in your 20s and 30s as shown through four different baseball players at various points in their careers.
posted by Copronymus (8 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is really fascinating; thanks for posting.

"We know what's happening to a 60-year-old versus a 30-year-old, but 30 to 33 -- especially somebody who is a physical freak like a major league ballplayer -- it's really tough to make detailed scientific statements," says Dr. Michael J. Joyner, an expert on human performance at the Mayo Clinic. "Just like people get better through marginal gains, and all of a sudden things click for them on the way up? People fail the same way. Marginal de-gains."
posted by chavenet at 8:55 AM on July 3, 2018 [1 favorite]


I really, really liked this. One of the weirder things about getting older is realizing how many amazing (fabulously wealthy) sports stars are younger than me and retiring right around my age.
posted by ChuraChura at 9:12 AM on July 3, 2018 [3 favorites]


QFT:

Surviving in baseball is a yearslong process of learning to get through this. It takes skill to believe, in the middle of the worst periods, that this too will pass. As Kinsler puts it, the advantage of being old is that you've learned how to handle even the longest stretches of failure because "you know it's going to change. Just from past experiences."
posted by chavenet at 9:15 AM on July 3, 2018


One of the weirder things about getting older is realizing how many amazing (fabulously wealthy) sports stars are younger than me and retiring right around my age.

It was definitely quite the thing to realize as I was reading it that the person closest to my age is Justin Verlander. I remember being younger than every player and now I'm keenly aware that I'd be older than most, but the middle part somehow didn't feel like it was happening at the time.
posted by Copronymus at 11:35 AM on July 3, 2018 [3 favorites]


Fascinating; thanks. Remember that top professional athletes are freaks in multiple dimensions: Physically, but also psychologically and mentally. Their physical gifts give them potential: Their bizarre focus, drive, and competitiveness allow them to achieve that physical potential.

Us normal, lazy people never even got close to our potential in our 20s and 30s, which is why we have the opportunity to be fitter in middle age than we were when we were young. Yes, there is a real decline starting in the early 20s, but that decline is tiny, which is important only if you're a world-class athlete to begin with. The decline is, on average, pretty minor up until age 50 or 60, if you remain quite active.
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 11:51 AM on July 3, 2018 [4 favorites]


One of the weirder things about getting older is realizing how many amazing (fabulously wealthy) sports stars are younger than me and retiring right around my age.

For a few years I've been keeping track of Dodgers who are older than me (I'm turning 38 in September), and all I got left are Rich Hill and Chase "Did you have good relationship with your dad? Me neither." Utley.
posted by sideshow at 12:55 PM on July 3, 2018


As Kinsler puts it, the advantage of being old is that you've learned how to handle even the longest stretches of failure because "you know it's going to change. Just from past experiences."

Until, you know, it doesn't.

This ends for everyone eventually, even if you've resorted to the chemicals that made Barry Bonds such a freak in his last couple years. So while you "know" it has to get better because you need to believe that, down deep you know that at some point it won't because you're human and getting older. Figuring out which is which while it's happening has got to be incredibly hard if you've been doing the same thing at such a high level for most of your life. I have huge sympathy for athletes coming to the end of their careers.

(Confession: I still play softball in my 50s against guys as young as 26, so my denial fu is far stronger than your so-called self-awareness. But I do play first these days.)
posted by Cris E at 3:20 PM on July 3, 2018 [1 favorite]


This is a topic I’ve been interested in since I read Bill James’s writing on the topic! Some random observations about the aging of baseball players not addressed in the article:

* James has a fascinating piece about “old player skills” vs. “young player skills”. Old player skills are walks and home runs, while young player skills are speed and batting average. James shows that young players with old player skills don’t last as long in the league as players with young player skills. There’s some kind of floor on speed and starting with more speed gives you more room to decline before you can’t play in the majors anymore. E.g., Ichiro and Rickey Henderson hung around for a very long time. Even in their 40s they could still field a position when their hitting declined.

* The decline is mercifully long and slow. This article puts the peak of performance at 26. Others put it at 27, but most people agree that baseball players are in their prime until age 33 or so, and can be counted on to perform well until 35. After that, a lot of batters fall off a cliff, possibly because they no longer have the minimum bat speed necessary to hit a major league fastball. This varies by position though. Second basemen seem to have especially short careers, seldom lasting much past age 33.

* The younger a player is when they break into the league, the longer their career is likely to be. A 19 year-old with the skills to play Major League Baseball is likely to be a hall of famer.
posted by chrchr at 7:36 PM on July 3, 2018 [2 favorites]


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