In honor of Rickey Henderson’s induction into the Hall of Fame this past weekend, I wrote a follow-up piece to last Friday’s look at which contemporary players are the most Rickey-like based upon a 10-category statistical profile: • Batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage: All three were maintained for this exercise, because they preserve the …
Tuesday afternoon’s appearance on the Fox Strategy Room’s “Last Call with Rick Leventhal” was a gas, if not the world’s most substantive or coherent discussion about sports. As with my previous appearance, I was joined by comedian Geno Bisconte, whose hyperactive mugging for the camera and willingness to tweak just about anybody kept me and …
To my surprise and delight, I’ve been invited to return to the Fox Strategy Room, where Steven Goldman and I appeared back in April in the service of promoting Baseball Prospectus 2009. For those unaware of its format, the Strategy Room is a streaming webcast conducted in a roundtable format and broken up into hour-long …
Whew, am I behind in my blogging. Here’s what’s not-so-new: • A Basseball Prospectus/ESPN Insider piece examining second-half strength of schedule, revisiting an earlier piece but using Hit List Factor instead of a team’s projected winning percentage. Here’s how the teams shake down: Team Season 1st 2ndBlue Jays .514 .497 .536Orioles .522 .510 .536Royals .505 …
Continue reading ‘Clearing the Bases: Post-Rickey, Pre-DC edition’ »
If it’s July, trade rumors are in the air, and if you’ve got ESPN Insider access, you may have seen that the Baseball Prospectus team, including yours truly, has been augmenting the site’s MLB Rumor Central area with some quick-hit analysis every morning, complete with bylines. Starting today, ESPN’s collecting those bits into the Insider-only …
I don’t hate the Mets by any stretch of the imagination, but I have to admit I’m fascinated by the frequency and ferocity of their self-immolations over the past few years. The latest has team brass cracking down on Jerry Manuel cracking wise about the team’s injury situation, while VP of Player Development Tony Bernazard …
Continue reading ‘Some People Crack Wise, Some Just Crack’ »
Major League Baseball cracks down on The Daily Show for rebroadcasting President Obama’s ceremonial first pitch at the All-Star Game with implied oral consent, not express written consent, or so the legend goes. That’s no way to treat America’s most trusted newscaster.
Enough with the first-half navel-gazing. Over the course of the past two days, Baseball Prospectus colleagues Steven Goldman, Christina Kahrl and I have offered second-half prescriptions for each of the thirty teams — one or two suggestions that could improve their outlook in the short or long term, depending upon their chances of making the …
So I watched the Home Run Derby and the All-Star Game this year, which is out of character with my recent history, though last year’s game at Yankee Stadium did bring me back into the fold. I couldn’t have done it without my TiVo, however, which reduced my total time expenditure to about three hours …
Continue reading ‘The All-Star Break is No Time For a Break’ »
Gene Autry or Aerosmith, it’s all good: [#1 Dodgers] Prodigal Sons: The Dodgers regain the Hit List top spot as Manny Ramirez returns from a 50-game suspension. He goes 6-for-18 with two homers and seven RBI, drawing louder jeers for being ejected after an awful strike three call than for his transgression. With Juan Pierre …