It was once stated that outdated guys couldn’t stick at shortstop.
“, it’s sort of like a working again after 30 [years old],” then-Rangers supervisor Chris Woodward stated again in 2020, marveling on the defensive longevity of Elvis Andrus. “Shortstops after 30? There’s not too a lot of them.”
As of late, although, one thing has modified. Here’s a plot exhibiting the variety of major shortstops qualifying for the batting title of their age-30 season or older. In 2026, there are 9 pacing to qualify, virtually touching the earlier peak in 2014:
I’m not completely certain why that is taking place. I believe it’s partly as a result of so many groups are signing shortstops to long-term contracts that carry them into their mid-to-late 30s. In case you’re spending at the very least $150 million on a shortstop, you’re going to need him to really play shortstop. A few of these shortstops of their 30s are exhibiting their age, whereas others have been at the very least strong defenders. However regardless that I can’t pinpoint precisely what’s occurring right here, I believe I can perceive how one specific shortstop is making it work.
Dansby Swanson will not be a toolsy freak like Trea Turner, sustaining top-end dash pace even in his ostensible decline years. Nor does he have a cannon like Carlos Correa, gunning down runners from deep within the gap. Swanson charges as a barely above-average runner with a weak arm. And but, over the course of this decade, he ranks as the perfect defender on the place by Baseball Savant’s Fielding Run Worth.
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Fielding Run Worth leaders, SS (2020-2026)
| Title | SS FRV | Innings at SS |
|---|---|---|
| Dansby Swanson | 60.2 | 7,599 |
| Francisco Lindor | 56.4 | 7,177 |
| Bobby Witt Jr. | 43.1 | 5,200 |
| Nick Ahmed | 33.1 | 2,717 |
| Ezequiel Tovar | 30.2 | 3,902 |
| Brandon Crawford | 25.6 | 3,421 |
| Miguel Rojas | 25.5 | 4,250 |
| Nicky Lopez | 25.4 | 2,090 |
| Masyn Winn | 22.9 | 3,021 |
| Nick Allen | 18.0 | 2,683 |
Supply: Baseball Savant
A lot of Swanson’s worth, it have to be stated, was compiled within the early a part of the 2020s. However whilst he’s misplaced a step or two over the past couple years, he’s managed to stay a plus defender.
Whereas writing this text, I began to consider the good tennis participant Daniil Medvedev. For a few years, Medvedev has managed to sit down at or close to the highest of the lads’s tour with flat groundstrokes of decidedly middling energy and a serve of inconsistent high quality. His superpower is monitoring each single ball down, no matter tempo or spin, and redirecting it deep into the courtroom. Not like Swanson, Medvedev would most likely grade out as a plus-plus mover. However I considered him as a result of, to my eye, they share a sure spatial genius.
Each Medvedev and Swanson exert the exact quantity of effort to trace down a ball on contact. In tennis, the defender should learn the spin and trajectory of the shot and know in a split-second the place to intercept the ball and the way their physique will should be positioned to finest return the shot. The shortstop does one thing comparable. Velocity may help, however the play is actually made within the learn off the bat. That’s when the shortstop should visualize the subsequent few seconds earlier than they’ve truly occurred, from the intercept level to the angle of their physique as they information the throw to first base, all whereas bearing in mind the pace of the runner and their projected place in house.
It isn’t pace or energy that makes Swanson an important fielder, however as a substitute this proprioceptive instinct that permits him to stay on the place with out superlative instruments.
This isn’t simply seen in his potential to trace down balls, but additionally within the potential to completely weight his throws. A put up I noticed the opposite day made this level properly: “My absolute favourite factor about watching Dansby Swanson play protection is he throws each ball to first with the EXACT quantity of zip it wants for every play. No extra, no much less. It’s a stage of really feel for the sport I’m undecided I’ve ever seen elsewhere.”
Again in 2023, Elise Menaker delivered a report on the Cubs broadcast on the origins of Swanson’s inside clock. At Vanderbilt, Swanson would observe beneath particular timing circumstances — the ball needed to be delivered to the primary baseman in 4 seconds or much less. These drills, Menaker reported, are the idea of his potential to beat the runner by a step each time, irrespective of the kind of throw.
It hasn’t been his most interesting defensive season. His +1 FRV this yr and +2 in 2025 recommend he’s now barely above common somewhat than elite, however the qualities which have made him the perfect of this decade — the intuit, the vary, the clock — have been, at numerous factors, on show.
Simply take a look at him on this groundball hit by Nathaniel Lowe earlier this month. Swanson slides to the bottom, corrals the ball, spins, and fires a throw that beats Lowe by a step.
At full pace, it appears fairly spectacular; at quarter pace, it’s even cooler. Off the bat, Swanson has recognized the exact intercept coordinates, and his small, uneven steps information him to that precise level. Simply previous to gloving the ball, Swanson begins angling his physique towards middle discipline, getting a head begin on the 360 spin to come back. He even throws in a little bit double clutch as soon as he realizes he has a handful of milliseconds to regular himself for the throw. All the things is calibrated.
He does this so incessantly that, later on this very same inning, he made an almost similar play:
Right here’s one other one for good measure, nabbing the extraordinarily speedy Jacob Younger at first. Discover how the whole course of is sped up, in comparison with the 2 highlights above, this time to match the tempo of the runner:
Swanson particularly excels on sluggish rollers; he’s gotten most of his defensive worth in his profession from coming in on balls. His clock is on show right here in a chaotic scenario, with a runner crossing proper in entrance of the ball, and maybe even deliberately attempting to intervene along with his sight line. Freddy Fermin, the batter, truly has first rate pace, however Swanson has the pacing precisely down right here, not ever dashing and nonetheless getting Fermin by a step.
On the play beneath, Swanson is confronted with a barely completely different problem – Chandler Simpson chopping a ball 5 ft in entrance of the plate onto a turf infield. Swanson’s pacing, naturally, is accelerated to match the pace of Simpson, and he will get him by the identical margin as he did Fermin.
Swanson could be stretched skinny in sure contexts. Turner is (nonetheless, someway) one of many quickest guys within the league; Swanson sat again on his chopper, and wanted a max effort throw to gun him down. It was not on the right track:
And Swanson simply doesn’t have the intense bodily talents to make the Bobby Witt Jr.-style performs deep within the gap to his proper. Savant’s mannequin gave Swanson a few 50/50 shot of constructing this play, but it surely didn’t actually ever seem like he had an opportunity:
If there’s a drive play at second, nonetheless, he can deal with it simply superb:
As all these outdated shortstops cling onto their jobs, Swanson gives a mannequin for a method that it might probably get performed. It doesn’t essentially take your mid-20s physique to excel defensively, but it surely may take an unquantifiable mixture of imaginative and prescient, notion, and really feel.