The 2000s were, in general, a great decade of talent at the shortstop position.
Miguel Tejada,
Derek Jeter,
Alex Rodriguez were among the many star shortstops to play in the 2000s in their 20s. But as they've all aged, the talent pool at short appears to have seen a considerable drop-off.
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In 2010, just
one player,
Troy Tulowitzki, managed to accrue 4+ rWAR -- significantly fewer than the seven shortstops that matched the feat in 2009. While there were a number of factors that contributed to it (injuries, disappointing seasons from
Hanley Ramirez and
Jose Reyes, etc.), it seems that there just isn't as much talent at short anymore.
This graph also paints a picture of a thinning talent pool...
2010 saw just six shortstops (in their 20s) reach 2+ rWAR -- which doesn't seem to bode well for the future. Now, I think it's probable that
Starlin Castro,
Yunel Escobar, and
Elvis Andrus -- each of whom failed to amass 2+ rWAR in 2010 -- are likely to change this picture. Taking those three into account, the current talent level doesn't seem as bad as the numbers and arbitrary cutoffs would lead us to believe.
What's really going on here, I think, is that prior seasons have been the golden ages at short. 2003, 2007, and 2009 were all seasons of very deep talent at the position. It's easy to see these as the dark ages when Miguel Tejada is the Giants' shortstop, but in actuality, it's only a thin talent pool in comparison to the great depth the position has had in recent years. I attribute this drop-off to random variation, and I'd say that the current talent pool is in fact fairly average (though certainly not as good as in previous years).
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