Young Athletes: When Athletes Make You Feel Older, a Memoir

They say that when Julius Caesar happened upon a statue of Alexander the Great, he wept. Caesar was about 30 years old at the time, and he wept because all the accomplishments that Alexander had, achieved by 24, made him feel inadequate.

Julius, don't feel so bad—you're not alone.

I have started to have my own moments like that, well, minus the world conqueror part. You see, I have begun to realize that while I get older, pro athletes are getting younger. Before I get too hasty, I still have some time, I'm only 22, but the days are coming where athletes who are younger than me will flood the sports landscape like a plague of youth. When that day comes—and it will—I will have to face the frightening realization that...I'm old.

I was reminded of this unwelcomed, upcoming event when the Chicago Cubs traded for first baseman Anthony Rizzo yesterday. Rizzo is older than me by about a month, and when I saw that, I breathed a sigh of relief. "Good, he's not older than me!" I exclaimed. Then paused. Thought about it for a second. "Four years ago this wouldn't have been a big deal," I thought and shuddered.

This is not an isolated event.

I have had my moments before—like when Starlin Castro became the first player to play a position born in the 1990's, and when John Wall and every subsequent freshman entered the NBA draft. There have been plenty of moments when I looked at an athlete's bio and surprisingly yelped, "He's younger than me."

The biggest, and the first, moment for me happened as I sat in my student union, during my freshman year at college. I was eating a hamburger and reading an article in my Sports Illustrated on how Graham Rahal had become the youngest race winner in the history of major American motorsports.

Rahal was 18.

I was 18.

While I was reading a magazine and killing time before my English 103 class, he was racing IndyCars. What was I doing with my life?

I'm not yet to the point where athletes younger than me are labeled: "Old," "Ancient," or "Dinosaurs." I'm not yet to the point when guys born in the '90s are being told by media personalities to retire. But I do remember not that long ago—or maybe it was forever ago—that athletes seemed to be as great as Caesar or Alexander, when I looked at their birthdates and saw they were from the long ago years of 1964 and 1971. I remember when athletes appeared to be giants.

Those days are gone, except in Rik Smits' case, 7'4" never appears short.

The days are coming when the athletes who are my age will finish their careers and retire. Then younger, sleeker models will replace them and start their careers, and when they do, they will continually remind me of the inevitable fact: I am getting older.