2014
21 posts
Team Off the Street
We built a team of Hall of Fame Outsiders this morning. Now, we are looking at present day team construction. How good could a team fully comprised of late December free agents be this year? Let's see what's available…
Hall of Fame's Best Outsiders
We did this once in 2010 and again at this time last year . The point is to construct the best team of players who have been eligible for at least one Hall of Fame vote. In other words, guys who retired after 2009, like…
Bienvenidos, Javier
We're not sure how long MLB lords allow this video online, ominously dreading that moment, whereas we may auspiciously enjoy this here and now, or, um, after a :03-second Pepsi ad: Welcome to the big leagues, Javier…
Today's Lesson in Volatilty of Pitching
It's been a long night, and just for fun, we checked in on the leaders in Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) metrics at the moment, morning of June 9, 2014. The Top 10 of FIP leaders, with at least 10 innings pitched…
Poof, It's Gone
Elite pitching with World Class velocity will be short lived. The human arm is not built to accelerate and decelerate at the speeds and angles required to throw a baseball over 90 mph. The risks to ill effects increases…
Fun With MLB Leaderboards
Some really scary news about Antarctica melting was in the New York Times today. A radical climate shift is most certainly upon us. I'm sitting in a sweltering office in midtown Manhattan. There was snow in these parts…
Players of the Fortnight
Lots of changes happening at the HQ of the ol' blog. I quit my job on Friday, which was a unique experience. Saturday, my baby daughter turned one fortnight old, which we celebrated with a brief walk in the park. As we…
On J.P. Arencibia
While considering J.P. Arencibia for my Hacking Mass team on Baseball Prospectus, I wondered how he managed to get 497 plate appearances with a .227 on-base percentage. After a quick spin of the Baseball-Reference Play…
Mets Legend, Desi Relaford?
This happened yesterday, but in this Mets fan's defense, Desi Relaford 's best season was with the Mets. According to Fangraphs, Desi Relaford earned -0.7 WAR over his 11-year career, in spite of 2.0 WAR in his one…
2014 MLB Season Preview
It's been a brutally cold winter across most of the Northern hemisphere this year, with feeble warmth from the hot stove. We are ready for warm weather and ballgames. At least the ballgames start this week. Let's look…
Fun with Spring Stats
We like to have fun with all kinds of stats over here. Usually, we look for something more valuable than a minuscule sample size of Spring Training stats that are almost meaningless because of varying competition levels…
Cleveland Indians 2014 Season Preview
Our series of interesting* team preview posts begins on the shores of the Cuyahoga River. In his first season at the helm of the Cleveland clubhouse, Terry Francona exceeded most expectations. The 2012 Indians went…
Handsy Grandsy
Thanks to our friends at reddit for the GIF
Baseball Organizational Replacement Value
As Vince Genarro wrote seven years ago , "A team’s location on the win-curve—their absolute level of wins—has a dramatic impact on the value of a win." Every year, we draw a line for replacement level at each position,…
Who Said Mike Trout's Not Perfect?
A special "thank you" goes out to Sam Miller for mentioning, on Effectively Wild , that he sometimes goes to BrooksBaseball.net for a quick snapshot of a player. Sam is right. It's great. It succinctly tells you a lot…
How May We Compare Slash Line Trends?
Former Mariners' Prospect, Wladimir Belentien , has been in the news lately for all the wrong reasons. While reviewing historical free agents available this late in the offseason , I stumbled across his…
MLB's Most Underrated Team
In response to Brian Kenny... 2013 All-Underrated Team: 1b: Belt 2b: Infante SS: Lowrie 3b: Seager C: Lucroy LF: Nava CF: Rasmus RF: Venable — Brian Kenny (@MrBrianKenny) January 27, 2014 ... below are some thoughts on…
Yankee Third Base Options
As soon as Alex Rodriguez 's 162-game suspension was announced, baseball writers and bloggers speculated as to who'd play 3rd base for the Yankees. Jay Jaffe summarized internal and free agent candidates to replace…
Rambling On, Revisited
Buster Olney reported in his column today that, contrary to trade speculation earlier in the season, David Price will likely stay with the Rays this season. " Ninety percent chance he stays ," one rival executive said.…
Walking from Philly to Oakland
Have you ever heard of a ballplayer from the 1920s and '30s named Max Bishop ? More than likely, you have heard of the '27 Yankees, with their menacing nickname: Murderers' Row . Max Bishop was not a member of…
Of Win Shares and WAR
Does it mean anything if WAR does not align with Win Shares? Working on a project for another site, had me doing an analysis of Orel Hershiser , Bret Saberhagen , and Steve Garvey . avWAR * Bret Saberhagen 59 (4.6 per…
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