The Golden Generation?

Charles Klein

Over the past few seasons, baseball fans have witnessed seismic changes to the game they grew up watching. Whether those changes are more stringent drug testing, instant replay for homeruns, or a more pitching-friendly game than has been seen for quite some time, the game has aged well and remained relevant.

As the saying goes, out with the old, in with the new. Having successfully discarded many of the steroid-taking stars from the game, a bit of a void has been created, waiting for a new crop of superstar players to take the game to heights heretofore unseen. And, you may ask, who are these players?

The Washington Nationals' Stephen Strasburg, the Florida Marlins' Michael Stanton, the San Francisco Giant' Buster Posey and the Atlanta Braves' Jason Heyward. And those are just the guys coming up this year. This quartet of young prospects appear on the cusp of taking over the game much in the same way that LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh have in the NBA.

While Strasburg, Stanton, Posey and Heyward were not all drafted in the same year, they have or will all make their MLB debuts in the same season. Stephen Strasburg, without queston, has become MLB's version of LeBron James. It is rare that a baseball prospect gets this much buzz and hype before he has thrown a single big league pitch. Strasburg is the first prospect to be brought up in the age of the 24-hour news cycle with Twitter and blogs covering his every move. LeBron James received just as much hype during his last year of high school, with ESPN broadcasting the games on national television.

Jason Heyward is the Dwyane Wade of this group. During Wade's rookie season he average 16.2 points per game with 4.5 assists per game. Overshadowed by LeBron, Wade still had a fantastic season. Similarly while we have all watched Heyward sparkle for the Atlanta Braves, the collective focus of baseball has been trained on Strasburg. Heyward, appears to be a lock for NL Rookie of the Year, hitting .266 with ten home runs and 39 RBIs.

Buster Posey is the Carmelo Anthony of this cadre of young talent. Like Carmelo, he will never get enough credit for what he does and due to his home city will not get as much attention as players on the east coast for his talents. Posey was called up last week from the minor leagues after the Giants concluded that there was no excuse anymore for keeping him down. Both Posey and Anthony play for franchises whose glories were long ago and who appear to be a few pieces away from challenging for a championship. In Posey's nine big league games, he is hitting at a .454 clip with four RBIs. While his average will not be near that by season's end, Posey appears destined for greatness based on everything that I have heard from people who know a thing or two about the game.

And finally Michael Stanton is Chris Bosh. While the Raptors and Marlins are pretty dissimilar as franchises (with one having won two titles and the other having won zero), Stanton and Bosh are pretty comparable. Bosh was not an instant producer during his rookie season, only averaging around 11 points per game. But he certainly grew into the league, developing into a five-time All-Star. Stanton appears more than ready for the Major Leagues, having already hit 20 home runs and driven in 52 runs this year in the minor leagues. But like Bosh, he has not gotten nearly the hype of Strasburg or Heyward. I expect Stanton to combine the sublime with the frustrating this season, as there will be more than a few games in which he goes 1-4 with a home run and three strike outs. Young power hitters like him usually take a bit of time before they adjust to the professional game, much in the same way that big men take longer to develop in the NBA.

Major League Baseball certainly has its fair share of young stars already in the game before this crop of rookies make their mark this season. Felix Hernandez, Justin Upton, David Price, and Matt Kemp all come to mind. But baseball has yet to see a class of rookies with this much talent all in the same season in quite some time. And this quartet could be the torch-bearers for the new MLB, a league cleansed of the stain of steroids and one that is ready to charge into the next decade as one of the best leagues in sports.