Rangers have MLB’s only 20-year veterans

Adrian Beltre is long past going to spring training trying to make the team. The five-time Gold Glove third baseman with more than 3,000 career hits is quite a rarity.

Going into his 21st big-league season, Beltre is one of only two current players who have played at least 20 MLB seasons.

The other is his new teammate with the Texas Rangers, 44-yearold pitcher Bartolo Colon.

“One, they’re extremely durable,” San Diego Padres pitcher Clayton Richard said. “And two, they have to be super talented, because to have that long of a career, you have to start really early and that means from an early age you’re talented enough to play with the best people in the world. So to combine those two things and play that long is one of the most impressive things in professional athletics.”

Of the 19,183 players listed by baseballreference.com as appearing in a big league game, only 156 have played at least 20 seasons . That is about one-thousandth of 1 percent of all players.

Carlos Beltran, like Beltre and Colon, played his 20th season last year. But the 40-year-old outfielder retired after finally being part of a World Series title with the Houston Astros.

Beltran was the 13th player since 2010 to end his career after playing that long, with Beltre and Colon the only others that could before 2020. It will be the fewest 20-year players finishing their careers during a decade since Hall of Fame members Hank Aaron , Brooks Robinson, Willie Mays and Al Kaline were among nine who made their final appearances in the 1970s.

“Well, 20 years is a long time. I think that you know the levels of conditioning and the demands of performance year in and year out just may take a greater toll now than they did in the past,” New York Mets general manager Sandy Alderson said. “When you’re talking about position players, you’re almost exclusively talking about the American League because of the ability