33anda3rd wrote:Nobody Wants Baseball's 30-Something Free Agents Anymore
Great read, and IMO really explains a lot about the state of baseball right now, which I think is not a great state for MLB as a whole.
From that 538 article:
If I remember correctly, strict steroids testing started in the offseason before the 2004 season, and penalties kicked in that season. That's right when these lines really diverge. The article does talk about that a little:
The average position player age reached this century’s peak — 29.3 years — in 2004, when PED usage had become so rampant that the league finally enacted penalties for testing positive. That age has been declining ever since and fell to 28.1 last season, suggesting that PEDs may have been artificially extending the productive lifespan of a significant number of older players.