happy 20k, mlb

 Major League Baseball reached a milestone yesterday. It's 20,000th player.

Baseballreference.com is generally my go to site for baseball statistics. They keep their statistics up to date, so it's very useful for tracking things like Albert Pujols' home run progress. Near the top of its homepage is a little bar that indicates how many players there have been in baseball history. Each day it's updated to add in whatever players played their first games the day before.

Last year I noticed that it was closing in on 20,000, so I've been watching -- and waiting -- for the counter to hit 20,000. Which it did today. Which means that the 20,000th player played yesterday. No, I have no idea who it was. No, I have no intention of trying to figure it out.

I mentioned this to a member of the Twitterati who's into baseball. He said that it seemed like a low number. Honestly, I'm not sure. I don't even know how to think about whether it seems low or high.

That said, I do think that the true number is probably higher. It's a known fact that the early days of baseball weren't well-documented. The early records that we have were compiled based on the work of devoted researchers who delved into old newspaper accounts (and whatever else is or was available). I wouldn't be surprised to learn that there were players -- maybe some who played in only one game) who have escaped the official records. Of course, having asserted that there are likely some such players, I have to acknowledge that I have little idea how many there were.