Gotta feeling 21 is gonna be a good year.

Especially if you and me see it in together.

I had no reason to be over optimistic.

But somehow when you smiled I could brave that weather.

Hello and welcome to episode 1638 of Effectively Wild a baseball podcast from Fanggraphs presented by our Patreon supporters.

I am Ben Lindbergh of The Ringer joined as always by Meg Rally of Fanggraphs for our first episode recorded in 2021.

Hello Meg.

Hello.

So I mentioned that I was about to celebrate a birthday a little while back. I did celebrate that birthday and I was thinking that we have really reached the age where players are starting to retire who are about our age.

And it's not even like they're retiring prematurely necessarily. It's just that they've reached roughly retirement age for baseball players, which is sort of a sobering thought.

But we're not at that stage of life where we start growing really fond of the Fernando Rodneys and Bartolacalones of the world, the ones who are still hanging on who are like the last player younger than we are.

We still have a ways to go until we get there, although we will get there.

But we are kind of at the point where players who are approximately in our cohort are starting to leave the game.

And it's sort of sad, you know, how he Kendrick retired recently and Kendrick is a few years older than I am.

But I remember him coming up as a prospect and the fact that he is now leaving the game makes me think about some things.

Because, you know, he was young and just embarking on what should be a promising career.

And now that career is over.

And that makes me think, what does that say about me and where I am in life. Fortunately, the aging curve for writers and editors and podcasters is a bit more forgiving than the aging curve for baseball players.

But Kendrick had a really nice career and all-time great world series moment, the kind that you dream about coming up. So good for him.

I was thinking about this again, though, on Sunday because Phil Hughes retired officially and got to be honest, didn't know that Phil Hughes was not officially retired already because he is not pitched for a couple of years.

So I knew him now as a person on Twitter and a YouTuber who opens packs of baseball cards, but he had not officially retired.

It's kind of like Bernie Williams, my favorite player growing up, who didn't officially retired until like nine years after he stopped playing. And at some point he finally said, okay, I'm officially retired.

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