rolling retirees: 2018 and beyond

about all you can say is that he didn't give up many homers

stephen drew

wes wilson, a backup catcher who hit .207/.260/.259 in 226 games over seven seasons in the yankee system

hadn’t really thought about it, but i guess matt holliday is probably done. good career; too bad he pulled a mantle and slipped under .300

batting average, feh

Aaron Laffey retired after Wednesday night's game. He had an 18.00 ERA in three starts with the 51s.

— Betsy Helfand (@betsyhelfand) June 7, 2018

MLB career K/9: 4.5

1,262,200 in career earnings if fangraphs is right

After suffering two concussions in the last eight months while playing in the Detroit Tigers organization, Blaise Salter has voluntarily retired from professional baseball because he fears the long-term risks that could come from brain injuries.

He’s afraid of ending up like his grandfather, Tigers great Bill Freehan, who has Alzheimer’s disease. Salter's only 24 years old.

While this close, loving family is fiercely private and sensitive about Freehan’s condition, Salter acknowledges his grandfather’s condition played a direct role in his decision.

“We are so close,” Salter said. “Seeing him the way his health has been, it’s definitely been an eye opener for me. I saw it firsthand how concussions have affected his life. Obviously, he had way more than I did, with the lack of equipment back in the day. To see that, I really thought about my life. I wanted to do anything I could, to prevent that from happening.”

There is evidence linking brain injuries to a higher risk of developing brain conditions like Alzheimer’s disease, according to the Alzheimer’s Association.

It is not clear how many concussions Freehan suffered during his 15-year Tigers' career, but his family suspects concussions played a role in his condition.

And it was enough for Salter to walk away from baseball.

https://www.freep.com/story/sports/columnists/jeff-seidel/2018/06/07/detroit-tigers-bill-freehan-alzheimers-blaise-salter/682734002/

http://larrybrownsports.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Jayson-Werth-hairy-bobblehead.jpg

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/23927548/jayson-werth-says-done-playing-pro-baseball

presumably Chase Utley

https://sports.yahoo.com/chase-utley-hold-press-conference-171946434.html

the first overall pick in the 2006 draft, luke hochevar

not a great career, but at least better than mark appel's

i don't know much about him, but why did the royals push him through their minor league system so quickly despite him never putting up good numbers?

there was some weird shit surrounding his drafting -- dodgers took him in the first round in '05, he agreed to sign then changed his mind, then played indy ball in early '06. he didn't sign with the royals until he was almost 23. high-end college pitchers are *supposed* to move quickly, and he made his big league debut a week short of turning 24, but . . . yeah i dunno. probably some combination of the royals being terrible at player development + the fact that hochevar insisted on an MLB contract and was therefore already on the 40-man roster

sometimes when a guy like that retires i like to see how much money he raked in for his career.

answer: just shy of 25 million

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/24380190/brandon-mccarthy-atlanta-braves-retire-end-season

ryan howard

Had no idea he wasn't already retired.

maybe he was hoping to pull a matt holliday but no one called

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dm_RhIrU4AAMM3k.jpg:small

They said it could never be done

a 6.66 K/9 would have been the icing on the cake but I shouldn’t quibble

david wright, after one final home series

Online prices for his presumed last start on 9/29 have skyrocketed in the last few minutes. (I already am going to the NY Film Festival that night.)

actually, not technically retiring but being medically sidelined a la prince fielder

Gulp.

https://www.mlive.com/tigers/index.ssf/2018/09/victor_martinez_retirement_1.html

reliever brad ziegler

a little surprising as he was still doing alright and getting saves this year.

Ike Davis has retired https://t.co/ciETMhLWTd

— HardballTalk (@HardballTalk) November 6, 2018

noted former pirate

Joe Mauer

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/25228494/joe-mauer-retire-15-seasons-minnesota-twins

Utley.

At one point I would have thought both those guys were headed for the hall.

they still might be

It's really too bad that the Twins never won anything with Mauer, they had some good teams but seemed to choke against the Yankees every year. Even with all his injuries he had a hell of a career.

our beloved adrian beltre

:( :( :(

nooooooo

bartolo : is now the last active* player who played in the majors in the 20th century

huh.

P sure Armando Benitez is playing in Mexico still

catcher dan butler, after 768 minor league games

played in seven games for the red sox in 2014 and two more this year, going 5-for-25 with three doubles and throwing out three of eight attempted base stealers. he was never drafted

THANK YOU... pic.twitter.com/CzhaoU9YUH

— Mike Napoli (@MikeNapoli25) December 8, 2018

Only reached 140 games twice--I don't know if he was the most productive long-term part-time hitter of the past couple of decades, but he must be close (including one monster season in 2011: .320/.414/.631, 30 HR and 5.5 WAR in 113 games).

I really wish the Jays had hung onto him after the Wells deal, instead of flipping him for a reliever who’s name time has forgotten.

reliever tom wilhelmsen, officially

outfielder colby rasmus, unofficially

Alfredo Amezaga (who will join Atlanta as a coach)

awesome

http://mlb.mlb.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?sid=l135&t=p_pbp&pid=150119

Jaime Garcia, 32 years old

https://www.mlb.com/cardinals/news/jaime-garcia-expected-to-retire-from-mlb/c-302541372

you wouldn't know from looking at his stats, but he really did have some exceptional stuff. sometimes it really seemed like he was throwing a wiffle ball out there. alas, he was almost always injured or recovering from an injury.

i just learned that he and Fernando Valenzuela were the only two pitchers born in Mexico to start in a world series.

former red sox third baseman of the future will middlebrooks

Willie Midds was basically a nicer, crappier Shea Hillenbrand

James Paxton is retiring after this season

charlie culberson. not much of a player, but he had some moments

Wasn’t he trying to become a reliever?

A career Rockie for Immaculate Grid--I need all the help I can get with that outfit.

https://www.mlb.com/news/charlie-blackmon-retiring-after-14-seasons-with-rockies

will leave 40yo charlie morton as our only active charlie

post baseball career gonna hit like thunder pic.twitter.com/WGQvZq1mnS

— Nude Austria (@vodkasnowflake) September 23, 2024

Kevin Kiermaier was left off the Dodgers WS roster and has maintained that this was his last season.

Too bad--some late-inning defensive heroics would have been nice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70D573iBRhI

Interesting--that's a meet-your-new-CF clip posted by the Jays before the 2023 season.

KK was in the dugout laughing at Graterol fielding the ball and holding it up for a while before throwing it to first

My friend and I were dying because we used to always do that in RBI Baseball - just hold it extra long in the spirit of cockiness

Nice exit:

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/10/daniel-hudson-announces-retirement.html

(I mean, except for the 21.60 World Series ERA...)

brandon crawford

I didn't know he played last year, I thought he was done after finished with the Giants. Pretty good career.

mike moustakas: 13 seasons, .247/.307/.431 (97 OPS+), 215 homers, 13.0 bWAR, three all-star selections, two pennants, one world series title.

among the first-round picks in the 2007 draft (he went second) he ranks eighth in bWAR behind josh donaldson, jason heyward, david price, mad bumgarner, todd frazier, rick porcello and matt wieters.

on march 31 he'll be signing a one-day contract to retire with the royals. which i always find weird, but i guess it's nice.

Lance Lynn

wow, didn't expect that! he put together a really good career. in his earlier years he always seemed to be overperforming, like how long could he last just throwing fastball after faster. turns out, a long time, and a 3.80-ish ERA and 3.80-ish FIP for his career. he was a reliable workhorse and from the glimpses i could get of his personality, he seems like a classic big goofball jock who would stuff you in a locker and eat 4 pizzas for dinner

Evan Longoria

I thought he was a decent bet for the HOF coming out of the 2019 season: about to turn 34, still playing regularly, 55+ WAR. Stalled after that, so now consigned to 3B purgatory with Graig Nettles, Buddy Bell, Sal Bando, Robin Ventura, and a few others.

Rolling Nosferatus: 2018 and Beyond.

https://www.mlb.com/news/rich-hill-signs-minor-league-deal-with-royals

I mean this with full respect, Evan Longoria was the Ian Kinsler of third basemen. Definitely a hall of very good guy.

otm

I should have said outside shot instead of decent, but here's where he stood after his age-33 season compared to Scott Rolen:

Longoria: 297 HR, 1015 RBI, .267/.335/.474, 121 OPS+, 55.5 bWAR
Rolen: 272 HR, 1062 RBI, .282/.370/.501, 125 OPS+, 58.6 bWAR

Other than Rolen playing his prime years during the PED era, I don't see a huge difference there. Rolen had three more good years after that; Longoria didn't.

matt carpenter

for some reason, there are 4 distinct versions of matt carpenter that stick out to me

1 in the early 2010s, he was a doubles-machine and an OBP-nerd’s dream. it seemed like every time he was up in a big moment, he came through. from memory, i believe in 2013 he hit something like almost 60 doubles? (*checks: he hit 55).

2 at some point, a cardinals celebration developed where a lot of the players, particularly carpenter, who was frequently standing out at 2B after hitting a clutch double, would make a “chip dipping into the salsa and stirring” motion. matt carpenter began selling salsa in st. louis

3 matt carpenter, the bad late career version, who would give you lower back pain just to watch him. clearly, it hurt and it hurts and it will always hurt. i also suffer from lower back pain and sciatica. however, i am not a professional ball player. he played through it and swung and missed at exactly 100.0% of pitches thrown in the lower quarter of the strike zone. he was physically incapable of hitting them and would swing over them, every single time, 100.0%. that is a record.

3a this doesn’t really deserve a full 4th spot, but during this era i got into playing the videogame “the show” on ps4 for a couple months. i was really bad at it, but i saw a youtube of a real life mlb player tournament and matt carpenter was a contestant. i watched a full episode of him getting his ass kicked by someone, i forget who. but what stuck out was how competitive he was and also how uncomfortable it was to be “around” him, even virtually

i remember version 1 well, the doubles machine! and hell, i’ll buy his salsa, whatever :D

What was that weird Yankees postseason version

That dead cat bounce where he was doing the giambi on cleveland golf-at-everything was fun

xp that was the cardinals devil magic that he withheld at a crucial time. but i was glad to see it was still in there!

forgot about this truly all-time matt carpenter moment. this is peak matt carpenter experience

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGsfhjYLQF0

tony kemp

kolten wong

jean segura

Jake Diekman

josh harrison

whit merrifield

unofficially: i recently noticed that adalberto mondesi hasn't played in the minors or foreign leagues since he played 15 games for KC then tore his ACL in 2022.

he was hot shit there for a little while; too bad he didn't even get to the majors until he was 27 (and therefore never made more than $7m a year)

you look at his numbers and it's sort of wild he only topped 4 WAR once in his career.
led the league in hits twice, SB three times, doubles once, triples once, topped out at 19 home runs one year and had a few season in the teens for HR. if he'd played in the 80's he would have been a legend.