You Could Look It Up: Position Changes
2/24The Devil Rays face a critical decision that may determine just how much they get from a talented player.
You Could Look It Up: Baseball Prospectus Infinity Edition #5
9/06Three players make the fifth edition, each of whom has a specific place in the game's lore.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: More Than Just The Babe
8/30Steven runs down the early history of Yankee/Red Sox trading.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: John Quinn’s Reign
8/24The recent passing of Gene Mauch got Steve thinking about the 1964 Phillies, and the great work done by their scion GM.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Any Infielder Will Do
7/25Steven investigates the "utility infielder disease" that plagues GMs near the trading deadline, and looks at a position in Pittsburgh that has proved particularly hard to fill.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Infinity Edition #4
6/23Two days after Christmas, Don Padgett got a present that changed his life. Steven Goldman has the story as the Infinity Edition returns.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Infinity Edition #3
5/05Steven Goldman continues The Infinity Edition by looking at Jeff King, Kevin Mitchell, Graig Nettles, and others.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Infinity Edition #2
5/04Steven Goldman continues his stroll through BP: Infinity Edition with a look at Elmer Flick, Cecilio Guante and more.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: The Infinity Edition
4/27Steven Goldman triumphantly returns to BP with a revisionist idea: to create player comments for those players who existed before Baseball Prospectus.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Tell Me Why…
10/01Current events inspire questions about the game's history. Steven Goldman has more answers than a box of Trivial Pursuit cards.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: On Bonds and The Babe
9/20When Bonds passes Aaron, if not before, there will be a rush to anoint him as the greatest something. Greatest home run hitter. Greatest actor in a non-singing part in a musical. Greatest beer and cheese combination. Greatest baseball player. This would be extremely short-sighted. To displace Ruth as the greatest ballplayer of all time, the aspirant must meet a higher standard. If the greatest baseball player is measured not just in muscles and eye-hand coordination but in his impact on sports and society as a whole, then Babe Ruth owns the title and has never lost it, never wavered in his possession of it, and never will.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Made, or Happened?
9/14In his quest to explain the Cardinals' greatness, Steven Goldman takes a look at some of the super-teams of the past.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: Shifting on the Fly
8/17You wouldn't think that Doug Mientkiewicz would have something in common with Hank Aaron and Mickey Mantle. That's why we keep Steven Goldman around.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: What’s the Value of a Deadline Deal?
8/06When teams rush to pull off a big trade at the deadline, does it really end up helping their chances? Steven Goldman takes a look back at previous trades to sort out what the results really were. This time, the Minnesota Twins.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: What is a Deadline Trade Worth?, Part 3
7/30Vaughn should have been solid for 1911, but a number of things were working against him. Hal Chase, the gambler, was the player-manager and is presumed to have subverted many games. Vaughn missed a month with an "illness," and didn't pitch well when healthy. He opened 1912 the same way, and manager Harry Wolverton--the New York Americans were going through a manager a year in those days--decided to send him to Providence of the International League. Vaughn balked, saying he would refuse to report unless given a small cash bonus and part of the sale price. This simply wasn't done in those days. Players were expected to accept their place as chattel. The Yankees waived Vaughn and probably expected him to drift back to the minor league fringes, but Clark Griffith, now managing the Washington Senators, put in a claim and added Vaughn to his staff. Griffith still liked Vaughn's stuff and thought that Hilltop Park, home of the Highlanders, might have worked against the pitcher. Whether that was the case or not we will never know, but Vaughn found himself in Washington and was never lost again, though it took the scouts a while to figure it out.
continue reading chevron_rightchevron_rightYou Could Look It Up: What is a Deadline Trade Worth?, Part 2
7/28From now until shortly after the non-waiver trading deadline, "You Could Look It Up" will examine the key mid-season trades for each franchise (with "mid-season" being generously defined as "June 15 to the end of the regular season") and evaluate each trade to see what a mid-season addition is really worth, and if possible to discern patterns and discover which deals really help and which are of little or even negative value. After we break down each trade, we'll come to a "snap judgment," a hasty conclusion. At the end of the series, we'll see if those judgments add up to any helpful conclusions...
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