He'll be in his Age 40 season in 2012, though...what sort of production might we see?
Let's take a look at players similar to Manny in the later years of his career. I'm going to ignore 2011 since he played only 5 games.
From 2006 to 2010 (Manny's Age 34 to 38 seasons) he put up a 151 OPS+ over 610 games.
Here are some comps for the same age range:
Player | G | From | To | PA | HR | RBI | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Honus Wagner | 161 | 713 | 1908 | 1912 | 3064 | 35 | 481 |
Edgar Martinez | 158 | 736 | 1997 | 2001 | 3204 | 141 | 557 |
Tris Speaker | 158 | 684 | 1922 | 1926 | 2963 | 56 | 439 |
Nap Lajoie | 157 | 631 | 1909 | 1913 | 2576 | 8 | 341 |
Gavvy Cravath | 153 | 631 | 1915 | 1919 | 2487 | 67 | 367 |
Manny Ramirez | 151 | 610 | 2006 | 2010 | 2532 | 120 | 416 |
Ty Cobb | 151 | 686 | 1921 | 1925 | 3056 | 38 | 469 |
Willie Mays | 150 | 715 | 1965 | 1969 | 2843 | 147 | 422 |
Willie Stargell | 149 | 566 | 1974 | 1978 | 2290 | 108 | 383 |
Chipper Jones | 148 | 610 | 2006 | 2010 | 2588 | 105 | 380 |
Stan Musial | 147 | 694 | 1955 | 1959 | 2870 | 120 | 425 |
Jack Fournier | 147 | 508 | 1924 | 1927 | 2031 | 70 | 347 |
Frank Robinson | 146 | 659 | 1970 | 1974 | 2712 | 124 | 401 |
Tony Gwynn | 145 | 637 | 1994 | 1998 | 2706 | 57 | 392 |
Larry Walker | 144 | 603 | 2001 | 2005 | 2401 | 112 | 405 |
Mike Schmidt | 144 | 724 | 1984 | 1988 | 2998 | 153 | 493 |
Ellis Burks | 142 | 559 | 1999 | 2003 | 2240 | 121 | 385 |
These guys all had at least 500 games over their Age 34-38 seasons and an OPS+ of 141 to 161.
Now here is what these guys did in their Age 40 seasons:
Rk | Player | Year | Tm | G | PA | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | BB | SO | Pos | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Edgar Martinez | 2003 | 141 | SEA | 145 | 603 | 497 | 72 | 146 | 25 | 0 | 24 | 98 | 92 | 95 | .294 | .406 | .489 | .895 | *D |
2 | Tony Gwynn | 2000 | 110 | SDP | 36 | 140 | 127 | 17 | 41 | 12 | 0 | 1 | 17 | 9 | 4 | .323 | .364 | .441 | .805 | *9/D |
3 | Willie Stargell | 1980 | 129 | PIT | 67 | 231 | 202 | 28 | 53 | 10 | 1 | 11 | 38 | 26 | 52 | .262 | .351 | .485 | .836 | *3 |
4 | Frank Robinson | 1976 | 104 | CLE | 36 | 79 | 67 | 5 | 15 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 10 | 11 | 12 | .224 | .329 | .358 | .687 | *D/37 |
5 | Willie Mays | 1971 | 158 | SFG | 136 | 537 | 417 | 82 | 113 | 24 | 5 | 18 | 61 | 112 | 123 | .271 | .425 | .482 | .907 | *83 |
6 | Stan Musial | 1961 | 118 | STL | 123 | 431 | 372 | 46 | 107 | 22 | 4 | 15 | 70 | 52 | 35 | .288 | .371 | .489 | .860 | *7 |
7 | Tris Speaker | 1928 | 95 | PHA | 64 | 212 | 191 | 28 | 51 | 22 | 2 | 3 | 30 | 10 | 5 | .267 | .310 | .450 | .761 | *8/79 |
8 | Ty Cobb | 1927 | 134 | PHA | 133 | 574 | 490 | 104 | 175 | 32 | 7 | 5 | 93 | 67 | 12 | .357 | .440 | .482 | .921 | *98 |
9 | Nap Lajoie | 1915 | 100 | PHA | 129 | 520 | 490 | 40 | 137 | 24 | 5 | 1 | 61 | 11 | 16 | .280 | .301 | .355 | .656 | *46/35 |
10 | Honus Wagner | 1914 | 92 | PIT | 150 | 616 | 552 | 60 | 139 | 15 | 9 | 1 | 50 | 51 | 51 | .252 | .317 | .317 | .634 | *65/3 |
If a guy from the first list doesn't appear on the second list, it means he didn't play in MLB in his Age 40 season (except for Chipper Jones, who is coming up on his Age 40 season now.) A lot of the guys immediately above were quite good in their Age 40 season--Mays, Edgar, and Cobb put up awesome seasons. But if you factor in all the guys above who weren't good enough to stick around until 40, our expectations for Manny shouldn't be all that high. Maybe he's good enough to post a season like Willie Mays, but the odds are good that he'll be at best league-average.