MLB Keeping Up With American Obesity Trends

Baseball players still have nothing on the obesity levels of NFL linemen (although the most athletic MLBer is on par with, oh, I don’t know ... Gus Frerotte), but they are doing their best to catch up. As Baseball Reference points outs, there are about seven times more 250+ pounders in the majors this season than there were 20 years ago. Here’s the full list of current deuce-and-a-halfers:

Prince Fielder / Jose Valverde / Tyler Walker / Bobby Jenks / Frank Thomas / J.J. Putz / Boof Bonser / Carlos Zambrano / Justin Masterson / Nick Blackburn / Adam Russell / Chris Young / C.C. Sabathia / Jason Botts / Chris Britton / Jeff Fulchino / Brad Nelson / Bartolo Colon / Chad Paronto / Jeff Niemann / Eddie Kunz / Jason Hirsh / Ryan Bukvich

Some of those guys wouldn’t necessarily be considered fat -- they’re just tall and/or big boned. Like you and me. But the fact that there are 23 guys weighing in at over 250 pounds today, compared to just three in 1988, says something about the size of today’s ballplayers. I’m not sure that “something” is a good thing, though. If this trend continues at its current rate, there will be approximately 161 MLB players tipping 250 in the year 2028. That’s about 20% of the league.

I say we reverse the trend now, and take it back to the old school, where there was just one biggin' for each generation. For example, Frank Howard was the only 250 pounder in the majors from 1958-1973. The lovable fat guy thing loses some of its fun when everyone’s overweight. Look at the Brewers as a microcosm of that. I think we can all agree that Prince lost a bit of his jolliness when CC came along. It’s like having two Chris Farleys in the room.

(H/T: Walkoff Walk)

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