On Tuesday, Baseball Prospectus announced its Top 40 Prospects for 2001. The driving force behind that list is Rany Jazayerli, but the good doctor gets input from everyone on the BP staff. Below is a sampling of the discussions that took place in December, when the list was being compiled. Rany Jazayerli: Here is my…
This week, Baseball Prospectus 2001 will be released to bookstores nationwide. As always, the book will contain our list of the top 40 prospects in baseball, as compiled by Rany Jazayerli, along with Jazayerli’s commentary on each player. To celebrate the release of the book, for the first time ever we are announcing our Top…
NOT GETTING HIS DUE It seems obvious to me that the attention Dave Parker receives in comparison to other players, and particularly to Jim Rice, has much to do with where they played. When Parker was the focal point of his team it was when he played for the Pirates. I think it’s fair to…
While Chris Kahrl pecks away at his latest Transaction Analysis (look for it this weekend), here’s a look at how the Baseball Prospectus staff broke down last week’s gathering in Dallas. Pennsylvania Blues Keith Law: Can I revise my Pirates essay to make it a comparison of Cam Bonifay to the average Palm Beach County…
While Willie Hernandez’s 1984 season was awe-inspiring, and deserves to be placed on a pedestal somewhere, I don’t think it is the greatest single season by a lefty closer. Consider Billy Wagner’s 1999 numbers: 74.7 IP 35 H 23 BB 13 ER (!) 124 SO (!!) 1.57 ERA 39 Saves Here are the same numbers…
Lost between the Mike Hampton and Alex Rodriguez signings was Monday’s annual Rule 5 draft. The major-league portion allows teams to select players left off 40-man rosters for $50,000, with the caveat that the player must be kept on the 25-man roster all season or be offered back to his original team for $25,000. The…
(Note: this contest is over, and the winner is being determined now. We’ll print the best of what we got early next week.) The Hot Stove League is now open for business. It’s a time for would-be contenders to improve themselves, for GMs to make moves and for sports-radio callers to second-guess them. It’s a…
Baseball Prospectus 2001 Do you know when next year’s book will be published? Will it be available again for advance purchase from Amazon? Also, will your group of authors be posting any analysis of the Arizona Fall League on the web site? –MT We expect the book to be available at the end of January….
The internet has decided this year’s IBA Players of the Year.
The Internet has decided this year’s Pitchers of the Year.
American League Perhaps not everyone considers him a rookie, but 32-year-old Kazuhiro Sasaki convinced enough voters to win the 2000 IBA Rookie of the Year award in the American League. The voting pattern indicates that Sasaki’s age and experience in the Japanese Leagues may have been a factor. He appeared on 57 fewer ballots than…
Rany Jazayerli: Civilization is ending as we know it, a plague of locusts has hit the Midwest and the sun rose in the west this morning. What bothers me most about watching everyone on TV pat themselves on their back for a job well done, is that everyone acts like the Mets and Yankees deserve…
Tough Cops… and Other Ones I just finished reading your article about umpires and stolen-base percentage. I just want to point out one factor that you did not consider in your article which throws all your statistics out the window. You did not mention whether they made the right call or not. If Chuck Meriwether…
Catching The Damn Ball Where are Vizquel and Ordonez on your list of top shortstops? And 20-30 runs possible difference from one position is high, isn’t it? Can the range be that large? –ZR Well, you can figure out the possible range of effects within a reasonable bound pretty quickly. Range Factor (RF) is a…
Lowering the Bar As far as Tony Perez’s Hall of Fame credentials go, here’s another way to look at it: Was anybody outside of Cincinnati a Tony Perez fan while he was active? You know, little kids emulating his stance around the schoolyard? Cherishing his baseball cards? I don’t think so. The same goes for…