92% of Padres Roster is Overweight

Last year I took a look at the Body Mass Index of the Padres Spring Training Roster.  I did this because Heath Bell was concerned that his Wii Fit told him he was obese so he used the video game to lose 25 pounds. 

This year I thought I'd recycle this blog post again (because it's good for the environment) and I'd check up on the team's progress but wait until cuts were made to get down the 25 man roster.  Here's the thing about me, I'm not a very patient guy so I'm going to post it now.

Before you get really critical of my use of BMI read this disclaimer that will tell you that the BMI stats you are about to look at are meaningless:

One basic problem, especially in athletes, is that muscle is denser than fat. Some professional athletes are "overweight" or "obese" according to their BMI - unless the number at which they are considered "overweight" or "obese" is adjusted upward in some modified version of the calculation.

With that in mind, let's also keep in mind that fans love beef cakes and being beefy might mean good things for our team hitting.  Shall I quote myself?  Sure.

It's no coincidence that the Greatest Padre Who Ever Lived was also the most overweight.  Tony Gwynn was 5'11" and weighed 225 at the end of his career and estimates he put on 50 lbs in retirement.  That put him at a BMI of 31.4 in his playing days and a 38.4 now.  As usual nobody can touch his numbers.

Now on to this year's stats.  The team's average BMI is 27.4.  Notice how all the players weights are rounded up. Check your own BMI using this calculator to see if you could fit in on this Padres roster.

• Underweight = <18.5
• Normal weight = 18.5-24.9
• Overweight = 25-29.9
• Obesity = BMI of 30 or greater