How is Turner still going strong at 39? Here are 4 big reasons

BRADENTON, Fla. -- Justin Turner has been around.

Only 14 active players have appeared in more games than Turner (1,539), and the 39-year-old entering his 16th MLB season isn’t just clinging to a bench role. He’s been brought in by the Blue Jays to boost this offense, crush lefties and lead the way.

None of this happens by accident. You can still be the young guy at 39 in some other jobs, but not baseball. Turner is one of baseball’s great outliers and the Blue Jays are betting on it staying that way, at least for one more season.

This is how he makes it happen, year after year:

1. Confidence in an identity
Turner’s 2014 swing change with the Dodgers changed everything. He entered that season owning a career .684 OPS, but he adjusted to hit the ball harder and, more importantly, hit the ball in the air. In the early days of baseball’s launch angle craze, Turner was one of the game’s biggest success stories.

That was a decade ago, though. Since then, Turner has learned how to lean into his identity as a hitter and make only small adjustments within it, not major overhauls. He’s also learned to trust his long-term process over immediate results, which gets easier as you age.

“It’s harder when you’re younger because you’re trying to stick in the big leagues, you’re trying to make a team, get through arbitration, do all of the stuff,” Turner said. “As you get older and there’s more of a comfort level, it’s easier to stay in the process and not chase the results. But I also think that the younger guys, if they stayed in the process more, it would be easy for them to get those results. It’s easy to talk about, hard to do.”

2. Know the data … then trust the data
Stick in the big leagues as long as Turner has and you’ll see a dozen different trends in data, analytics and the equipment that spews it all out.

Step one for Turner? Understanding the data in his own language to establish a level of comfort.

“Then, I can take that data and use it effectively,” Turner said. “I think sometimes, for younger guys who still aren’t fully aware of themselves, the data can be paralyzing. They’re overthinking, trying to do too much, thinking they can’t swing at this or they have to swing at that. There’s no freedom in that. I like to take the data and put it into a plan that’s still going to allow me to have freedom.”

3. Work hard, but work smart
If you haven’t heard, it’s a long season. The flights and late nights all add up, on top of the games themselves. Turner knows the value of hard work as well as anyone on this roster, but all of that effort needs a focus.

“There’s a lot of prep work and a lot of stuff that goes into making sure you’re ready,” Turner said, “but as you get older, you start understanding how to get your work done in more efficient ways so that you’re not killing yourself for two or three hours before a game trying to get ready. You start minimizing those routines so you can do them efficiently and it’s not going to cost you anything between 7:00 and 10:00.”

4. Eat right, feel right
The morning after a late night or a day of unhealthy eating feels a lot different at 39 than it does at 22. That goes for everyone.

The biggest change that Turner has made? Cutting out dairy.

Turner felt that dairy was adding to the inflammation in his body, which brings us to the recovery process. Post-game recovery and the routines involved aren’t the most exciting thing in baseball, but they’re one of the most important. How an athlete treats their body in the hours after maxing it out can be so important, particularly in a sport so relentless.

“Playing the schedule we do, with 162 over 180 [days], you have all kinds of inflammation as it is,” Turner said. “To do that for three hours, then go into the food room and stuff more inflammation into you, is kind of a bad recipe. I found that’s been a really, really big one for me to recover, bounce back, sleep better and just not feel as crappy.”

That’s the goal. It’s why Turner has already put together such an impressive 15-year MLB career, and why the Blue Jays are betting on No. 16.