If there was ever a good time to be old, this is it. Just look at what’s going on out there. Or, just look at what’s happening with the world champions of baseball. In the course of a weekend the Phillies signed a 36-year-old late-blooming outfielder to a three-year contract and allowed a 32-year-old slugger – coming into his prime athletic years – walk away.
Better yet, the Phillies signed a 46-year-old pitcher to a guaranteed two-year contract. In fact, to hear general manager Ruben Amaro Jr. tell it, making Jamie Moyer one of the oldest players in the history of the game at the end of the deal was one of his top priorities this winter.
But Moyer ought to feel a little shortchanged these days. That’s because just a day after his two-year deal was announced, Penn State gave a three-year deal to an 82-year-old man to coach the football team.
Moyer needs a new agent.
Nevertheless, it’s a helluva thing that’s going on. Actually, it’s kind of inspiring and causes a little head scratching, too. Sure, Joe Paterno has been screaming at the kids to get off his lawn for decades now, but something seems to be working these days. Paterno’s team plays USC in the Rose Bowl in two weeks, but next season is when they could be playing for the championship.
That’s all after Paterno had hip-replacement surgery, too. You know, kind of like Chase Utley.
Paterno and Moyer weren’t the only old-timer having a good 2008. Dara Torres, at 41, set an American record in the pool at the Beijing Olympics and came home with three silver medals.
Still, though the signings made headlines and media-types expressed amazement at the fact that older athletes are still productive. They just don’t get it despite the scientific evidence showing that age really is not a factor in determining ability in sports. Torres, of course, is a prime example. At just a smidge under six-feet tall, Torres competed in the Sydney Olympics at 160 pounds. But at 41 went to Beijing at a lean and mean 149 pounds of chiseled muscle thanks to workouts that stress flexibility, strength and recovery.
A high level of fitness and an insatiable competitiveness appears to be the key to athletic longevity. Plus, she just loves to swim.
“In some ways, I’m like all the other swimmers (going to the Olympics) because I still feel the passion for what I do,” Torres said. “In some ways I’m like none of them, because I’ve lived their lives twice.”
Torres is just one example. In Beijing French cyclist Jeannie Longo-Ciprelli competed in her seventh straight Olympics – and then turned 50 a few weeks later.
The best example might be hockey player Chris Chelios, who at 46 has shown no signs of slowing down (or retiring). After 25 years and three Stanley Cups in the NHL to go with four appearances in the Olympics for the U.S, and a broken leg suffered during training camp a few months ago, Chelios made his season debut for the Phoenix Coyotes last weekend.
He says he wants to keep playing until he’s 51. Chelios will keep going until they ask him to leave, just like Paterno.
Chelios’ secret? He’s part of Don Wildman’s “Malibu Mob,” a consortium of athletes and celebrities/fitness freaks who workout together with the aim of pushing each other well beyond their limits. Actually, it’s kind of like a sadistic science experiment in which the group enjoys pushing one another until bodies’ revolt and spew one fluid or another.
They do it for fun.
Moyer, meanwhile, became the second oldest pitcher in baseball history to win at least 16 games last season. The only other guy to do it was Phil Niekro who pitched until he was 48. And though Moyer enjoys the records, he really doesn’t get caught up in them. That’s something he’s saving for when, or if, he retires.
“You start getting caught up in things like that and you might start losing some focus on things you need to do,” Moyer told me recently. “I think there’s plenty of time for me to look back at the end of the season or at the end of my career and say, ‘You know what? That was cool,’ or ‘I remember that,’ or ‘I remember that game.’ But for me, having the opportunity to have the longevity that I have is the most special thing for me. To continue my career and to play and to contribute with a team, I think that is first and foremost. If you are around long enough, those things are going to start to happen.”
Moyer has no timetable for retirement and may even seek another contract when the current one ends.
“Look, I feel great and I’m pitching well and I love playing so I have no plans to stop,” he told me in a late-season interview. “But I could come in here tomorrow and the desire could be completely gone.”
Clearly that’s not the case. Moyer prepares and competes at 46 no differently than he did when he was a green rookie coming up with the Cubs in 1986. However, if there is something behind Moyer’s motivation to continue to pitch (and to pitch well) it seems to be the slights he took from baseball people back when he was struggling in the early 1990s. No, Moyer didn’t cite it as a motivating cause, but then again he didn’t have to.
“Fourteen years ago I was told to retire,” Moyer said with a smirk in a recent interview.
Moyer was unfamiliar with Torres’s story when asked, but quickly became interested in the finer details. Particularly, Moyer agreed with Torres’ idea that consistent workouts, a solid fitness foundation and smart recovery were the key to athletic longevity. Then he pondered the reasons why some players give up the game long before they could.
“Some players get injured and others just lose the desire,” he said. “Then some, for one reason or other, are told to quit because they reach a certain age or time spent in the game. Some just accept it without asking why.”
Moyer, to paraphrase a famous quote, asks “why not?” He expects to turn in his customary 200-innings and double-digits win total in 2009 simply because he always does those things. It’s important to note that Moyer has not missed a start for injury since 2000, has been on the disabled list just once dating back to 1997 and just three times during his professional career, which began in 1984.
Better yet, NLCS and World Series MVP Cole Hamels seeks out Moyer as a Jedi would seek out Yoda. To Hamels, Moyer had all the right answers.
Kind of like Yoda.