A new reality, both celebrated and cursed, has propagated in recent years as teams have increasingly promoted players in their early 20s and increasingly shunned players in their early 30s.
Major League Baseball has gotten younger.
Many in the game, from players to managers to coaches, believe one of the biggest effects of this generational shift has been a change in clubhouse dynamics.
Perhaps in few other places is this youth movement more of a factor than with the Padres, one of the majors’ youngest teams through all of 2019 and officially its youngest (average age of 26 years, 186 days) at the end.