Midwest League 2007

Average Team Ages

This page compares the ages of the players assigned the teams of the Midwest League on opening day of the 2007 season.

Team ages matter. They tell you something about the player development philosophies of the parent organizations, and give clues about the makeup of your local team. Some organizations draft mainly college players, others mainly work with high school talent. Some teams rush players through the system, others move prospects along slowly. A team with many players signed from the Frontier League is likely to be older than one with a large Latin American contingent.

While systems generally have year-to-year consistencies, over time things change. The Angels, for instance, fielded older MWL teams a decade ago; a management change has resulted in a shift to relatively young players. Over the same period, the Diamondbacks have shifted in the opposite direction, though the change has been less extreme.

This is one clue about how our baseball families build their organizations. Don't read too much into it--but it's interesting knowledge.

The Midwest League's been aging in recent years. This year's collection is slightly older than last year's, which had been the MWL's oldest season. That appears to be significant; the typical Midwest League player is half-a-year older than he was a decade ago.

                                   Pitchers    Hitters     Team

League Average                       22.1       21.9       22.0

Western Division
Beloit Snappers               MIN    22.1 (7T)  21.4 (10)  21.7 (10)
Burlington Bees               KC     22.3 (3T)  22.8 (1T)  22.5 (2T)
Cedar Rapids Kernels          LAA    21.4 (13)  21.2 (12T) 21.3 (12)
Clinton LumberKings           TEX    22.2 (5T)  21.5 (9)   21.8 (9)
Kane County Cougars           OAK    22.9 (2)   22.4 (4)   22.7 (1)
Peoria Chiefs                 CHI-N  21.2 (14)  21.2 (12T) 21.2 (13T)
Swing of the Quad Cities      STL    21.7 (12)  22.1 (6T)  21.9 (8)
Wisconsin Timber Rattlers     SEA    21.8 (10T) 20.6 (14)  21.2 (13T)

Eastern Division
Dayton Dragons                CIN    22.1 (7T)  22.1 (6T)  22.1 (6)
Fort Wayne Wizards            SD     21.8 (10T) 22.2 (5)   22.0 (7)
Great Lakes Loons             LAD    21.9 (9)   21.3 (11)  21.6 (11)
Lansing Lugnuts               TOR    22.3 (3T)  22.5 (3)   22.4 (4T)
South Bend Silver Hawks       ARI    22.2 (5T)  22.8 (1T)  22.5 (2T)
West Michigan Whitecaps       DET    23.0 (1)   21.8 (8)   22.4 (4T)

• Oldest Player in the League: Quad Cities Catcher Chris Grossman (born February 3, 1981)
• Youngest Player in the League: Wisconsin Shortstop Carlos Triunfel (born February 27, 1990)

Ages are in "years", which are calculated as of July 1, 2007. Rankings show the oldest teams as (1) and the youngest as (14) or (13T).

This data is derived from each team's opening day roster, April 5, 2007. Ages for players were determined from easily-available sources, and averaged.