Forty-one-year-old Dan Brouthers played 45 games in the Eastern League with the Springfield Ponies and Rochester Broncos in 1899.
Brouthers hit .241.
Bert Myers, Brouthers’ 25-year-old teammate in Springfield, told The Buffalo Commercial playing with the aging legend wasn’t pretty:
“It was painful to see him double up like a rusty hinge as he ducked for low-thrown balls, and I sometimes imagined I could hear his knee joints crack.
“(Manager Tom) Brown signed Dan for his batting, but the big fellow was puny with the stick and no one realized that fact more painfully than the veteran himself. ‘Young fellow,’ he said to me one night after a losing game in which he fanned out three times. ‘I ain’t the Dan I used to be. The ball looks smaller, no bigger than a pea sometimes as it shoots up to the plate. Bless you, I can remember when I could count every seam and read Al Reach’s name on it as I clouted it out for two and three base soaks. Reach’s name was branded on the balls in those days. Once I made the pitchers look like a bad dollar. But now I’m a bum nickel with a hole in it.’
‘”It’s time for the old war horse to chase himself to the stable and browse on past recollections.’ A few days later, Dan was released at his own request.”
Brouthers did request his release from Springfield in June. The Hartford Courant said:
“He told Manager Brown that he did not want to be a mill-stone about his neck, or words to that effect.”
Five days later he signed with Rochester.
Less than two weeks later he asked for his release again. The Buffalo Enquirer quoted him:
“’I am satisfied that I have seen my best days on the diamond and am ready to quit.”
Brouthers came back for more seasons, from 1903-1906. He was 0 for 5 in five in two games with the New York Giants as a 46-year-old in 1904.
He found better success in four stints in the Hudson River League—he hit .337 In 811 at bats, finally retiring for good in 1906.
Baseball History Daily 