age 27 as cut-off date?
by ufo on Jan 21, 2011 11:56 AM EST
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i'm wondering at what age do you give up on prospects that haven't made it yet? .. and is there a general # thats good to use as a rule of thumb?
i've always heard that 27 is the year for alot of players, but that seems to be more for hitters.. that also seems like an awfully long time to wait if the player hasn't made it yet.... do pitchers have any age to go by? i.e. Cliff Lee was a late bloomer, possibly all of his owners dumped him in dynasty leagues with deep minors systems .. i hate seeing mistakes like that, so i tend to wait on alot of players too long.. i'll keep players like Matt Gamel. Chris Marrero, Chris Nelson, and Max Ramirez in favor of many new pedigree prospects in their teens/early 20's... sometimes its too tough a choice.. is this a bad strategy?
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I think you're thinking of a player hitting their peak at age 27, not an age you give up on them as a prospect.
Carlos Triunfel is turning like 22 this year and many people have given up on him as a prospect. I can’t think of one specific age where you give up on a player as a legit prospect but its certainly before 27 I would think.
I would think you better start figuring it out within 2 years of graduating from college age. So if you enter the minors at 21 as a first round pick, I would hope you’re not sucking at age 23-24. If you enter the minors after high school, then you’ve got more slack. If 2 years after being drafted you haven’t quite put it together yet, then many people would say “well he would only be a college sophomore by now” but you’d still hope for good production based on tools by age 22-23.
I think if you’re still in the minors when you’re 25-26, that’s when you really question the ceiling of a player.
by Kenneth Arthur on Jan 21, 2011 12:03 PM EST reply actions
Obviously depends case by case
but I would generally say if a prospect hasn’t made a splash by the time they’re 25, it’s not terribly likely that they will
pitchers = no age
If you were 35 but could throw 95 with movement and location you would still be a prospect.
That could become Adam Miller
It depends.
In terms of ranking, prospects slide down precipitously after the age of 23. For the most part, this is for good reason – when we’re ranking prospects, we’re talking about the players who are most likely to be very good in MLB for a long, long time. I almost think that thinking about minor leaguers needs to be broken into two categories – first there’s the top prospects, potential impact players who could form the core of championship teams for years, and then there’s everyone else, who you just kind of keep on your radar and wait to see if anything comes of them.
Players get forgotten when you only think about prospects. Usually this is fine, but as guys like Casey Blake and Andres Torres show, old players can break out too.
I’m not sure that answers your question, but for me, i’ll just say there’s a difference between “giving up” as in leaving them off of top prospect lists and “giving up” as in simply concluding they don’t have a major league future. One happens a lot sooner than the other for me.
That said...
there is one category of guys who I do “give up” on early. Those are players who reach the top levels of the minors and fundamentally demonstrate that they don’t have the basis to develop major league skills. On my own team, examples of this would be Mike Carp (doesn’t have the bat speed or batting eye to be a regular) and Carlos Peguero (not very athletic and his approach is too flawed to make it in MLB as a bat-only player).
In strict prospect terms (age/performance relative to league) these guys shouldn’t be too old, but when a player’s ceiling looks to be clearly defined, and that ceiling is something below major league regular, I don’t lose too much sleep over giving up on him.
I will also mention that even though his performance record looks solid and he’s still pretty young, I’m about 1-2 years away from giving up on Alex Liddi as well. He could change my mind by showing some impressive skill development this year, but right now he looks to me like a player who will fall just short.
Andres Torres
Not sure what I want to say, but I fee like he should be mentioned here for some reason.
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I'd say 26 is the age most batters stop developing
For pitchers somewhere in their early 30s. There are a lot of late-blooming pitchers
There's no specific age
But if a player isn’t a major league regular by the time he’s 27, there’s about a 99% chance he’s never going to be a major league regular. And with most players, you realize this well before they’re 27.
Sometimes you do get an Andres Torres, but these players are the exception, not the rule.
i wonder..
if this can ever be made into statistics
theres alot more hitters developing late then just Andres Torres.. so it would definitely be less then 99%
The thing...
that makes breakouts like Andres Torres’ rare is not only that guys in their late 20s/early 30s rarely break out, but also the fact that a lot has to go right for them to prove their breakout was for real in the majors. Torres was great in limited action in 2009, but came into spring training behind Eugenio Velez on the depth chart despite being better defensively. There’s a strong bias in favor of younger players and established veterans for those final roster spots that the older breakout guys are competing for. On top of that, since these guys are already older, there’s a much narrower window of time to prove themselves in the majors. Breakout or no, they’re still in their physical decline phase.
You’re seeing this phenomenon in play this year with the Mariners. They signed Luis Rodriguez – probably the best bet to be next year’s Torres/Casey Blake – to a minor league deal. Rodriguez is a 31 y/o career journeyman with a lifetime .728 minor league OPS. But he plays good defense at 2B and can handle SS capably, and broke out to the tune of .293/.364/.493 in the International League last year. He got a ST invite, but he’s competing with Brendan Ryan, Jack Wilson, Adam Kennedy, Josh Wilson, and Dustin Ackley for a MLB roster spot. I’m not optimistic he’ll see any time in Seattle in 2011, so there’s a very good chance we’ll never know if his 2010 breakout was for real. He pretty much has to wait for an injury to come up as a utility infielder.
I’m convinced, by the way, that this is the reason we get the stereotype that catchers develop slower. Unlike other premium positions, it’s a lot easier for older catchers who are solid defensively to break into the majors and get regular PAs, both because there’s a very low offensive bar for the position and because every team needs to give substantial PAs to at least 2 catchers throughout the season.
That should read...
Torres came into the 2010 Spring Training behind Velez.
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