I started looking at how many guys aged 35+ had a 150 or higher OPS+. In any given year there usually were not very many (never more than 4 which was only once, in 2007). So I dropped the cutoff down to a 130 OPS+ with 400+ PAs. All data from Stathead.
The first time period I looked at was 1982-2007 because there were several years in that period with players matching the criteria. Then I looked at 2008-2025.
From 1982-2007 there were 102 player seasons with at least a 130 OPS+ and 400+ PAs. Just about 4 per year (and this includes 2 strike years, 1994 & 1995 when about 115 & 144 games were played, respectively). Then from 2008-2025 there were just 30 cases. That is 1.76 per year (over 17 years since no one got to 400 PAs in 2020).
If we used an age 37 cutoff, the 1982-2007 period had 36 cases. 2008-2025 had 11.
Going back to the age 35 cutoff, there were 24 cases from 2001-2025, There were only 7 from 2021-2025.
If we use a 150 or higher cutoff for OPS+, 1982-2007 had 27 cases or about one per year. There were only 10 from 2008-25, .588 per year.
If we go with a 150 cutoff for OPS+ and look at the last 13 years (2012-2025 which makes 13 seasons if we take out 2020), there were 5 seasons for guys aged 35+. In the previous 13 seasons, 1999-2011, there were 22. That is about a 77% decrease.
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