Calvin Johnson, Mike Trout among athletes whose primes were wasted

Since 2012, Trout has the highest slugging percentage of any hitter to play at least 500 games, the third-best batting average and he’s walked more than any other player. He’s hit the third-most home runs since his rookie year in 2011, which is remarkable considering first-place Nelson Cruz has played 200 games more since then, and was caught juicing in the Biogenesis scandal. When you extrapolate out from Trout’s AL Rookie of the Year campaign, Cruz has smacked 12 more dingers than Cruz in 164 more games. But, he’s only been to the playoffs once in 11 seasons.

Cruz, who hit more home runs than any player of the last decade, has been to a pair of World Series. Trout has played in only one postseason series, a sweep at the hands of the Royals in the 2014 ALDS, and is the reigning poster boy for wasted primes. The worst part is that he doesn’t seem content to play out his career in purgatory.