6. Bartolo Colon retires
For the last several years, Colon has been baseball’s ageless wonder.
Current and eternal major leaguer Bartolo Colón turned 44 today.
When Colón made his debut. Mike Trout was 5 years old. Bryce Harper was 4. pic.twitter.com/FSjsrPHHJN
— ESPN (@espn) May 24, 2017
But every pitcher reaches a point where he just doesn’t have it. Eventually, everyone’s stuff just gets to a point where MLB hitters eat them alive.
From 2011-2016, Colon posted a 3.63 ERA and a 1.22 WHIP. He allowed more hits than you’d like from a starter (9.5 H/9), but made up for it with a stellar BB/9 rate of 1.5.
Things have regressed in 2017.
He’s allowing more hits (11.4 H/9), and while his walk rate (2.4/9) is still strong it’s not good enough anymore. Colon also has a 6.96 ERA and 1.59 WHIP.
At 24 or even 34, we could just chalk this up to a bad few months. But at 44, Colon is already playing with house money. It’s hard to imagine his career going much longer.