The major reason people turn to fantasy baseball websites like this one is to get an advantage over their competition. They want to find strategies to win their league. What if a most frequently used strategy turns out to be based on a lie? It only needs to be repeated enough to be accepted as gospel. I submit this is the case for the following subject.
“Baseball players peak at age 27. You should target these 27 year old players during your draft, because they will have ‘breakout’ years.” This statement is bogus. The overwhelming majority of the time, that player will NOT have a career year. It is hardly ever true. If you are going to make this statement, you’d better show me your statistical evidence or I’m calling you out.
Reading this year’s predictions, every local newspaper lamented that the Yankees and Mets pitching staffs were “too old.” This is like saying they won’t win because their uniforms are too blue. Gee if only we could get younger arms like Pittsburgh and Colorado. Even if this myth is true, and I’ve never seen stats to prove that it is, pitchers have different skill sets than hitters. Their peak years are not the same. For starting pitchers think of wines, age before beauty.
It is so broad a statement that it needs to be clarified and broken down by position. I’d expect the evidence to show catchers depreciating the fastest, since that position takes the heaviest toll on a body. Next would be centerfield, shortstop, with first base as the last refuge for the old man. But, for most positions I wouldn’t expect any degradation until at least 35. I’ll give you an example of a signing ripped unfairly based on a bogus accelerated depreciation schedule.
The Red Sox recently made a great move by signing David Ortiz to a long-term contract at a reasonable price. Yet I heard many analysts unfairly ripping them, saying it won’t work out in the long term. They believe Ortiz will depreciate based on the “peak at 27” myth. He is now 30. They say the Sox will lose out during the last years of his contact. The “experts” don’t understand that a DH like Ortiz has a different depreciation rate than a regular player. All baseball players are not the same. He has no wear and tear from playing in the field. As long as he keeps from getting injured by swinging the bat and running the bases, he should be fine. He easily has another 6 great years left in him.
I know one person who picked Milton Bradley in his draft’s top 100 solely because he is 27. This is a bad reason to make a bad pick. Bradley won’t steal bases because Oakland doesn’t run. He won’t get off to a good start because with the exception of this year’s Eric Chavez, everyone in Oakland starts slow. He is a big injury risk. And I’m not saying the guy is a mental case, but he is 2 properties short of a monopoly. I'd rather get a guy with an upward trend who improves every year, instead of jumping on a guy whose age just happens to be the magic number.
Even non-Keeper leagues have an overwhelming fascination with youth. People want the sexier, younger players. Well, you look at Jennifer Garner and Jennifer Anniston and tell me they are over the hill. Tell me you wouldn't open a door for them. I don’t buy it.
I conducted a new study by looking at every starting pitcher in their teams 2005 opening day rotation and examining their performance that year. Out of those 150 pitchers, 19 of them were the magic age of 27. This age was well represented as 13% of all pitchers. How would they produce in 2005? How many of these 19 would have career years?
It turns out that roughly half produce above and half produce below their career averages at age 27. This is what you’d expect in a typical year. Last year had 7 under performers (Luke Hudson, Kip Wells, Vogelsong, V. Padilla, K. Wood, Od. Perez, Mulder.) 3 had an average performance (Maroth, Fossum, S. Kim.) There were 4 with good, but not breakout years (N. Robertson, Halladay, J. Seo – only 90 IP, and Westbrook.) (Tom Verducci has called Westbrook’s 2005 season his breakout year. However, I’m not fooled by his high Win total, Westbrook was better in 2004.)
It looks like 5 of the 19 (26%) had breakout years (Chacon, Chen, J. Sosa, Patterson, and Oswalt.) Only let’s look a little more closely at these 5 “Breakout” years.
Chacon only had his breakout based on his second half of 2005, once he got out of Colorado. When the Yankees first got Chacon I was willing to throw all his Colorado stats out the window, because of the Coors effect. Usually half a season isn’t enough to make a career year. However, with his poor ratios it is very likely that 2005 was indeed a career year for Chacon.
Chen had shown some promise as far back as 2000 with the Phillies. Yet, 2005 was the first time he started more than 15 games. Only time will tell, but I don’t see him surpassing his last years numbers.
Jorge Sosa had previously pitched on some very bad Tampa Bay teams. 2005 was his first year in Atlanta and he went 13-3 in 20 starts. Like Chen I also don’t see him improving over last years numbers.
John Patterson showed promise in 2004 with an incredibly high strikeout rate of over one per inning. 2005 was also the first year he started more than 15 games. Unlike Chen, I see him improving and dominating for a long time. Put him on a good team and he’s easily a 15 game winner.
Roy Oswalt is the breakout example that bothers me the most. Oswalt’s stats last year were nearly identical to his 2002 numbers.
2006: 20-12, 2.76 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 184 Ks.
2002: 19-9, 3.01 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, 208 Ks.
He did not have a career year last year. In fact, right now Oswalt is the most consistent high-level pitcher from year to year. He is the safest starting pitcher to draft. (The next wave of fantasy baseball analysis will be giving each pitcher reliability scores. You can bet that Oswalt will get a high score while Prior will score at the bottom.) The mainstream media finally discovered Oswalt last year as a result of Houston’s success. So they made it sound like he fell from the sky. In reality he had been pitching at this high a level for years.
So excluding Oswalt, 4 of 19 (21%) had career years. But remember, for most of them this was their first chance. It is easy to say that someone had a career year at 27, if 27 is their only year. You don’t have any other full season to compare it to. Over time this percentage can only go down.
The most depressing thought about this theory is that once a player turns 28, he is over the hill. That’s a negative way to play. So even if you bought into the 27 theory and drafted Oswalt and Patterson last year, now that they are 28; are you going to drop them from your team? That doesn’t make sense.
A similar myth is that older pitchers are more injury prone. While it is true that pitchers in general are more injury prone than hitters, age has nothing to do with it. For every David Wells you can point to, I can point to a Prior, Harden, Sheets, Burnett, Patterson, Lowry, Sabathia, etc. These are all young starting pitchers dealing with injuries. The veterans know how to handle their bodies. They know what they are capable of. They know not to extend themselves in spring training. If you say a pitchers age increases his injury risk, I don’t see it at all.
I’ll give you an example of two pitching staffs - one drafted by an “expert”, and one drafted by a novice fantasy player. (Both of them were smart and followed fantasy’s golden rule by never taking a starting pitcher in the first 5 rounds.) They both took pitching at the same average draft positions in the same middle to late rounds.
Team A: Schilling, Contreras, Mussina, Maddux, Glavine, Rogers.
Team B: Zito, Lackey, Capuano, Penny, Marquis, Bedard.
You tell me whose team is better? The staff of Allstars or the staff of 27 year olds.
