While watching the most recent Mat Latos outing, Dick Enberg and Mark “Mud” Grant remarked about not having pitch speeds available during spring training games. They had a bit of concern, or question, about Latos and his spring struggles. Two things popped into my mind. First, they’re sitting in Peoria, Ariz., home of one of […]

Tangotiger is creating another community database again. This time, he’s asking fans to determine how often each player on your favorite team is expected to play this year. Tango’s community surveys are always a source of new insight and provide useful benchmarks for the “experts” out there. Please drop by and throw in your two […]

A few weeks ago in this space, we posted an interesting piece of research conducted by a friend of mine named Andy Moursund. He had examined his personal collection of vintage Sporting News issues, and compiled the results of Spring Training games from 1945 through 1962 that pitted American League teams against National League teams. […]

20,000 days ago was a big day for two slam-dunk Hall of Fame baseball players: One made his debut and the other hit his first homer. First, the debut: It was arguably the pitcher with the best-regarded peak in history: Sandy Koufax. Now, I should note the previous sentence refers to his place in the […]

TJ Simers attempts to bully Marcus Thames. A man, who. apparently, is just as much a useless person as he is a baseball player. He writes for the LA Times?! He criticized his granddaughter’s spelling in his column?* * I actually checked to make sure that he didn’t write a humor column. Well, a non-funny […]

You hear it all the time, “Keep your eye on the ball.” The problem is, hitters are rarely—if ever—able to carry out the task. The human eye, with all its complexity, just can’t keep up with the simple task of tracking a ball.* * Okay, there may exist a few special athletes who have been […]

If a sunk cost is released in New York, does it echo? In the Mets case…yep. On the heels of making Louis Castillo available to the rest of baseball, the Mets did the same with a left-handed pitcher. So, in the most likely case, the Mets will pay these two about $18M this year to […]

Dave Studeman’s scholarly review on this page of John Thorn’s scholarly book on the origins of baseball can be topped only by Bob Newhart’s classic revelation of the game’s roots. Listen and laugh.

For weeks, rumors have swirled that the New York Mets intended to release second baseman Luis Castillo. The wait is now over. Both Mets and rival scouts believed Castillo to be the best second baseman in camp, but the Mets leadership and new manager Terry Collins were probably eager to eliminate a reminder of former […]

If you’ve read through the comments on my latest Hardball Times feature—Pitching (almost) always wins championships —you’ll notice that a few have pointed out that my graph may be misleading. Full disclosure: It is. Given that, I’d like to post a couple of additional graphs and some thoughts as an addendum to the original piece. […]