I posted the deal yesterday about wide receivers and ages. Specifically, I look at the ages that wide receivers posted the best numbers of their careers. And we saw very few receivers putting up their best numbers either before 25 or after age 30.
But one reader in Wisconsin didn’t like that approach. He wanted to see more numbers in general – not forgetting about a player’s production at age 29 just because he happened to compile his career-best numbers at 27.
With that in mind, let me slice the numbers slightly differently. This time, I took the top 200 seasons (by wide receivers) in the last 20 years. Then I looked at the number of players in each group in that list. It turned out like this:
TOP 200 RECEIVER SEASONS SINCE 1995 | |
---|---|
Age of player | No |
21-year-olds | 2 |
22-year-olds | 6 |
23-year-olds | 11 |
24-year-olds | 15 |
25-year-olds | 25 |
26-year-olds | 26 |
27-year-olds | 22 |
28-year-olds | 20 |
29-year-olds | 21 |
30-year-olds | 14 |
31-year-olds | 14 |
32-year-olds | 9 |
33-year-olds | 5 |
34-year-olds | 7 |
35-year-olds | 2 |
36-year-olds | 1 |
Notice that ages 25 and 26 are the most popular, and the only five groups were at least 20 players are all in the ages of 25 to 29.
While Odell Beckham Jr. was a notable exception last year, you see hardly anyone under 23 represented. Similarly, it really tails off after age 31.
—Ian Allan