Baseball has a big problem. My love for the sport and the energy I have exhausted trying to defend it my whole life makes it hard for me to write that sentence. But it does have a problem, which trickles down the branches of the entire sport, from the Major Leagues to youth leagues.
Early Friday morning Miami Marlins second baseman Dee Gordon was suspended 80 games for using performance enhancing drugs. This is problem enough for Major League Baseball and the Marlins, who will be losing their version of the Flash for half the season. Steroids in baseball has been discussed ad nauseam in the past decade, so I won’t delve into that. What bothers me about this incident is that it is a reminder of the hyper intensity of the game that has ballooned into something nearing catastrophic.
In a recent issue of Sports Illustrated Jeff Passan gave us a bare bones look at Perfect Game, an organization that helps young baseball stars showcase their talents in front of scouts from all over the country. It’s like kid pageantry but with a ball and bat. At these tournaments that bring the crème de la crème of teen baseball together, 15 year-old pitchers are hitting 95 and 96 MPH on radar guns. I remember when reaching 40 in the PitchZone at the fair was a big deal.
My problem is not with the intense competition—I think that comes with the territory and has always been a part of even the lower ranks of Little League. My problem, and the problem that baseball will have to face in the coming years, is that these kids are being overworked. Teens at this level no longer just pitch from March to September; they are throwing every day at maximum velocity year round. There is no offseason to play basketball or football or soccer because, once they hit high school, they are specialists. In order to be recruited for college, no less make the big leagues, they have to compete with other teens giving their own maximum effort, every day of every week of the year. It is an arms race, but with actual arms of ligaments and muscles.
We have already seen the attrition rates of this fairly new phenomenon. A young pitching prospect truly isn’t considered seasoned yet unless he has had Tommy John Surgery to strengthen his elbow. In the last six years, more Major League pitchers have undergone the surgery than between 1974 and 2009. That this has become almost habitual means that young pitchers are blowing out their arms.
In 2015 only three pitchers over the age of 30 (Max Scherzer, John Lackey, and Zach Greinke) finished in the top-twenty in Cy Young Award voting. MLB can look at this and shout from the rooftops that baseball is becoming a younger game that is more exciting and more attractive to youngsters across the country. But I think this stat shows a glaring problem—there are incredibly few pitchers over 30 who are successful in the league. Back in “the day,” and by that I mean 2004, four of the top-five American League Cy Young vote-getters were over 30. We could watch pitching artists like Greg Maddux confound hitters in his late thirties. Curt Schilling was able to power through his starts for almost twenty seasons.
How long will Noah Syndegaard’s career last? The Mets’ starting pitcher is blowing by Major League hitters with regular 98 MPH heat, but how sustainable is that? He is 23 years old and already a sensation, but he is likely to combust before 30.
The optimist in me points to Nolan Ryan, the father of the fastball, who lasted 24 seasons in the big leagues without slowing down. But the difference between Ryan and Syndegaard, and all the current flame throwers, is that Ryan’s arm did not face the same wear and tear of those today. He did not pitch every day of his childhood or try to top 90 MPH when he was in middle school. He played other positions and other sports to give his arm some rest.
But now with the hyper intensity created by Perfect Game and a great deal of high school coaches (and parents) nationwide, these young arms get no rest. It is terrific for young pitchers to get Major League offers in their early teens, but it comes at a price. Their constant training will wear their arms down to sinewy shreds before becoming Major League veterans. And there is no way to slow them down.
This brings me back to Dee Gordon. Baseball’s steroid problem has had big hulking poster children like Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, whose greed for success pushed them to superhuman levels. Yet the majority of PED incidents in Major League Baseball come from players needing an extra boost to move just ahead of the competition. Like Dee Gordon and Chris Colabello, who was also recently suspended for 80 games, these players are willing to use whatever means possible just to make it to the top levels.
How are we to believe that no young pitcher involved in the radar-gun wars won’t do the same? With the need to hit the high 90s and the blind obsession with throwing the hardest among peers, what is stopping these kids? I’m not just talking about steroid use, which for all we know could be rampant in these youth programs, but simply overworking the arm to be the hardest thrower. Not the best pitcher, but the hardest thrower.
Lighting up the radar gun is exciting and (debatably) attracts fans. But this obsession has already cut careers short. It ruins the chances for long and healthy stints in the big leagues, and it forces many to burn out before reaching the top. The incoming generation of pitchers will not last. They will no doubt enter with a bang but will soon exit with a whimper. •
