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    [OC] Distribution of FIFA Player Overall Ratings by Age
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    [OC] Distribution of FIFA Player Overall Ratings by Age


    Hey everyone! I plotted this boxplot to explore how FIFA player Overall ratings vary with age, and the trend is pretty fascinating. Here is what I found:

    • Each box represents the spread of Overall ratings for players of that age.
    • You can clearly see a climb in ratings through the early 20s, peaking around 26–29.
    • After 30, there's a gradual decline, but some older players still hold elite ratings (looking at you, Cristiano 😉 ).
    • The color transition (blue to red) shows the aging curve too.
    • Age 24–29 seems to be the sweet spot where most top-tier players fall.
    • Even in the 30+ range, the median remains fairly strong, showing how valuable experience is at the top clubs.
    • There’s a steep drop in both number and quality for players over 36, except for a few outliers who are still top-class.

    Data: From the FIFA dataset
    Tools: Python, pandas, seaborn

    This is my first time posting here, and I would love to hear thoughts from football nerds.

    Posted by CableInevitable6840

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    5 Comments

    1. sm0r3ss on

      Interesting dataset. I think doing ANOVA and Tukey as post-hoc to show statistical significance between early groups and later groups could strengthen the observation.

    2. nikas_dream on

      I’m curious if the rating plateau at age 27 onwards is due to sampling rather than valuing experience. Players in their 30’s who decline tend to retire, and thus leave the dataset. If you’re playing at 40, it’s because you’re still good enough to play.

    4. Celysticus on

      I would ditch the blue to red color since that info is already present on the x axis. It adds confusion if anything because I wouldn’t expect age to be represented twice. One idea would be to do a clustered violin type plot and make each dot color representative of number of titles earned for that player or number of years on a pro team.

    5. MordorsElite on

      Ohhh, it took me way to long to understand what I was looking at, cause I initially misunderstood the rating to refer to the Multiplayer Rank of players of the Video Game FIFA xD