At what age do prospects stop developing?

[Tyler87898]

This came up because in my current draft, there is a 23 year old prospect who looks like first round talent. However, due to his age, I'm kind of worried how much time he has to develop fully.

Here are his ratings from my scout:

Contact: 48/88
Gap: 56/71
HR: 43/58
Eye: 35/59
Avoid K's: 31/59

So he's not completely raw coming out of college, but I wouldn't say super close to being MLB ready.

Just wondering what you guys think of draftees like this?

[Curve Ball Dave]

It's different with every player. Some guys keep on developing even after they reach the Majors and become HOF caliber guys. Others don't get much better than they already are and can't get past the AA level.

Don't overthink things. If you like the player, think he can help one day at the Major League level, draft him. If he doesn't pan out, there's always another draft next season.

[Tyler87898]

What about even after drafting? Let's say this guy was actually 25 with the same ratings/potential. I'm guessing it would be a lot less likely he would reach his full potential, but I wonder if it is actually possible.

[locuspc]

Players don't develop much after 25 and it's hopeless after 28. At 23 you still have a shot, but I'd discount the potential a little bit.

[MathBandit]

If I thought players stopped developing after 25 I'd probably never draft a college player again.

[fredbeene]

Originally Posted by Tyler87898

This came up because in my current draft, there is a 23 year old prospect who looks like first round talent. However, due to his age, I'm kind of worried how much time he has to develop fully.

Here are his ratings from my scout:

Contact: 48/88
Gap: 56/71
HR: 43/58
Eye: 35/59
Avoid K's: 31/59

So he's not completely raw coming out of college, but I wouldn't say super close to being MLB ready.

Just wondering what you guys think of draftees like this?

I assume it is 30 since that is when POTENTIAL ratings don't get imported and are never used for the rest of career

[fredbeene]

yet players can develop new pitches to play longer IRL....that seems like still developing to me

[locuspc]

Originally Posted by fredbeene

yet players can develop new pitches to play longer IRL....that seems like still developing to me

there's two types of development, filling out potential and talent change randomness. AFAICT talent change randomness never stops and would account for the sort of cases you're talking about IRL. but if you're evaluating a prospect on his scouted potential, that will stop for the most part by 25 and pretty much entirely by 28.

[Pelican]

My impression is that college players, at 21 or 22, have less ceiling but a more secure floor, as compared to prep players at 17 or 18. International players are more like the latter. I prefer drafting good college players - particularly those who have played three or four years - because they are much closer to the major leagues. The best ones can start in AA. But of course any organization needs younger prep and international players, who will slowly work their way through rookie leagues and all levels (unless they skip a level or wash out). But of course YMMV when drafting young guys. Maybe your scouts are geniuses and never miss.

[billyray1984]

It really depends on your tcr level, the player, his personality, how he'll actualy perform in the minors, etc. 23 year old is old to enter pro ball and his floor doesn't seem all that good. I have drafted guys this old before (mainly pitchers), but they better be almost MLB ready and need at most a season of AA/AAA. For pitchers it makes the most sense to draft a bit older since they're always at risk of catastrophic injuries in the minors and they are usually more volatile than position players by a good margin.

With that being said, I added a guy to the 40 man last year to play some left field/DH in late August since we had a lot of injuries and I just needed a lefty bat who wouldn't embarass himself and picked the guy with the most wrc+ in AAA. He was literally crushing AAA (175 wrc+ with a 300 babip in 300+ PA, so he wasn't even lucky) and when I looked closely, I saw that he was a 6th round pick of mine and had been in my system for TWELVE YEARS before finally getting called up to the bigs. I cull my minor leagues roster religiously every year and he just got lucky to never get cut for whatever reason.

After his promotion, he continued to rake, so I put him on the playoff roster as a platoon bat. So the tcr fairy can still visit very late, but it's rare.

Sadly I had to DFA him the very next off season to make room for a younger guy and he didn't want to take a minor league deal again so he's now gone. Had he not been a completle liability defense wise, I would've seriously kept him as a utility bat/mascot.

[Pelican]

So, I somewhat shamelessly sign those kinds of guys for the independent league team I run, to give them a place to play.

[koohead]

Originally Posted by billyray1984

It really depends on your tcr level, the player, his personality, how he'll actualy perform in the minors, etc. 23 year old is old to enter pro ball and his floor doesn't seem all that good. I have drafted guys this old before (mainly pitchers), but they better be almost MLB ready and need at most a season of AA/AAA. For pitchers it makes the most sense to draft a bit older since they're always at risk of catastrophic injuries in the minors and they are usually more volatile than position players by a good margin.

With that being said, I added a guy to the 40 man last year to play some left field/DH in late August since we had a lot of injuries and I just needed a lefty bat who wouldn't embarass himself and picked the guy with the most wrc+ in AAA. He was literally crushing AAA (175 wrc+ with a 300 babip in 300+ PA, so he wasn't even lucky) and when I looked closely, I saw that he was a 6th round pick of mine and had been in my system for TWELVE YEARS before finally getting called up to the bigs. I cull my minor leagues roster religiously every year and he just got lucky to never get cut for whatever reason.

After his promotion, he continued to rake, so I put him on the playoff roster as a platoon bat. So the tcr fairy can still visit very late, but it's rare.

Sadly I had to DFA him the very next off season to make room for a younger guy and he didn't want to take a minor league deal again so he's now gone. Had he not been a completle liability defense wise, I would've seriously kept him as a utility bat/mascot.

I love guys like that. Always fun when people come out of nowhere to play meaningful roles.

[billyray1984]

Originally Posted by koohead

I love guys like that. Always fun when people come out of nowhere to play meaningful roles.

Another thing I love is signing guys who are about to hit a serious milestone but who are left languishing in FA. In one of my previous games, Al Kaline was about to hit 600 HR (he was maybe 3 short) and nobody wanted to sign him since he was 43 and any semblance of hitting for average had left him. He had played for me in his prime but had left in FA.

Mammoth power with rookie league level contact. So I signed him as a bench bat/platoon guy and he got his 600 HR in July. He was just awful, hitting sub .200, but I couldn't leave him 3HR short. He retired with 600 flat.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by locuspc

there's two types of development, filling out potential and talent change randomness. AFAICT talent change randomness never stops and would account for the sort of cases you're talking about IRL. but if you're evaluating a prospect on his scouted potential, that will stop for the most part by 25 and pretty much entirely by 28.

Yeah, this is pretty much how it works, although now you can adjust the approximate age when players stop developing and also when they start aging.

The league I do has higher development and lower aging, so the "natural" setup is more of a plateau (high schoolers often develop by the time they're 23 or 24 although I do see college players sometimes taking until 25 or 26 to really get going, and then it's relatively "flat" until players get into their mid 30s). However, I also have TCR at I think 150 at the moment, which makes career minor leaguers turn into ML quality players and sometimes the opposite. In this universe I think younger players still have some value even if they don't pan out all the way because at 26 they still have several years where they can get lucky and become something whereas even if a 36 year old discovers the secrets of success, they'll probably only be able to hang onto that for a couple of years before aging kicks in for them.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by koohead

I love guys like that. Always fun when people come out of nowhere to play meaningful roles.

My favorite case of this in my league right now is the first baseman for the Montreal Expos (this is a fictional/historical league in the offseason of 1970/71), who was previously a little-used pinch-hitter for the Orioles, was named the starting first baseman on Opening Day at the age of I think 34 and has hit 62 HRs in 2 years. He has a total of 84 for his entire career.

[PSUColonel]

I am so desperate for a CF that I signed Roman Quinn as my every day CF. I have a bunch of other CF players who can hit a bit better, but can't really play defense over the level of 50 or 55. Quinn is a 60, so we are going him the job. (manager and myself)

Obviously there will be games where maybe more offense could be needed, so he won't start, but it shows you can plug & play different guys for different roles, which is quite realistic if you ask me.

[evansodo]

A follow-up question I had is,

If a prospect injures their arm / hand, and depending on the severity of the injury, is it possible for the injury to delay or stop 'development' of say arm or range rating?

[Syd Thrift]

It can - I'm not sure if time spent on the DL allows a player to develop or not, but injuries definitely slow development down - and what's more, if a player suffers a very bad injury their potential ratings can suffer.

[billyray1984]

Originally Posted by evansodo

A follow-up question I had is,

If a prospect injures their arm / hand, and depending on the severity of the injury, is it possible for the injury to delay or stop 'development' of say arm or range rating?

Very anecdotal evidende here, but arm injuries seem to hurt prospects far more than established guys because of the loss in time played in the minors coupled with the rating loss that can happen, which is why drafting high school pitchers is a complete crapshoot and you have guys drafted in the later rounds who become major league pieces because they never got seriously hurt and were visited by the tcr fairy. I've still had players develop current ratings while on the IL (even pitchers with arm injuries).

Every serious pithcing prospect I sign/draft now gets his strategy locked and managed by me and gets a quick hook, a pitch count and the "quick hook when faitgued" box checked. This seems to have reduced by a lot the amount of catastrophic arm injuries my young players suffer in the minors and leads to more usable pieces in the future when drafted out of juco/college (HS pitchers are still a complete crapshoot though).

Not sure if the same applies for position players. I've had Ohtani need TJ twice, thus ending his pitching career, and he still had a 75 arm in OF when he retired at age 43.

[RedsoxFan]

This is probably a new question but along those lines. When the you see the green arow up or red arrow down in the minors, what is that based off of. Is it a scout recommendation, a coach or something else?