In 2011, Billy Butler picked up the nickname "Country Breakfast." In 2012, he hit 29 home runs.
He may have gotten married, or had kids, or saved some kittens from a fire... I don't really know or care. This blog is about baseball and he almost hit thirty dingers. I realize this is a pittance of a number for most baseball teams, but the fact is, no matter how many Royals players took steroids, none of them could oust Steve Balboni from the top of home run mountain at One Royal Way.
Now, a couple of things should happen when you pick up a kick-ass nickname and start hitting the long ball: 1.) You should become famous and 2.) You should hit even more homers.
The latter is really on true if you are of a certain age, and that's what I'm getting at here.
Billy Butler will turn 27 in April. Smarter people than me have typically pointed to this as the year most players hit their prime and turn in career years.
A long discussion about this can be found over at Hardball Times, but to save you the click, I'll post a chart from the article here.
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| Depending on the length of a player's career, he will typically have his best seasons between ages 26 and 30. |
Now, Mr. Breakfast has been raking since he came into the big leagues, but last year saw him walk a bit less and mash a lot more.
He also grounded into fewer double plays, since it's hard to double a guy up when you are watching a line drive scream over your head.
Overall, Butler had his best season as a big leaguer in 2012, and he did it heading into his prime years, rather than on the way out, which means it could just be the preamble to something amazing in 2013.
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