Jake

QUOTE (SouthsideDon48 @ Jan 18, 2014 -> 12:25 AM) I think people writing with a different hand than they throw with may be more common than you think. I write left-handed, but I throw balls with my right hand. I toss trash in the trash can with whichever. My parents tell me that when I was little, I didn't seem to throw better with one arm than another. Since my older brothers were right-handed throwers, they knew they had gloves for me so I became a righty. I write left-handed and would generally call myself a lefty. But noooo, I couldn't be a left-handed pitcher!

For another dystopian choice, I have always preferred Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, who was English but lived much of his life in the USA and was repeatedly denied citizenship for refusing to fight on philosophical, rather than religious, grounds. He also taught biology to a young George Orwell, which is cool. I've always thought Huxley's warnings were more prescient -- that freedom would be surrendered, not taken

From Yar Golf's poorly designed, confusing website's "about" section:

For some reason, my first reactions were Less Than Zero and Bright Lights, Big City as they cover very interesting parts of recent American history that aren't really immortalized in the grand narrative. Neither are super difficult reads; the former was written by a then-college student. Might be a little out there though, in terms of content. I bet both of those books have been burned. Now that I think about it, the whole child rape thing in Less Than Zero is probably too much. Kerouac's On the Road might be of some thought, but it has been a long time since I've read it so I cannot remember what kind of reading level we're dealing with. Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God is deeply rooted in American history and I recall reading it at that age. Has a lot to offer in a variety of ways and is generally considered a "classic." If it is possible to go with a collection of short stories, I'm sure there are some from John Cheever which might be interesting --his stuff is rather cerebral, but quite American and since they come in small doses, I wonder if it would be easier to get kids interested in reading small, self-contained stories. Part novel and part short story collection, I might also suggest Shoeless Joe comes to Iowa by WP Kinsella. While it is quite a bit more than this, it is indeed the inspiration for Field of Dreams. The best and worst of America. Ironically all from a Canadian author who loved baseball, Iowa, and Shoeless Joe. For some reason, I can't come up with a good suggestion from Hemingway, who is an obvious choice given his writing style. All of his best stuff is set in Paris and Cuba, at least the things coming to mind. The Nick Adams Stories were dreadful to read as a 10th grader by my recollection, though they are at least set in Michigan IIRC

Jesse Stones

Hey Anaheim.. SUCK ITTTTTT

Sometimes you sign a guy not for it to be a good deal, but because you want him on your team. Imagine if Mike Trout became a free agent -- you wouldn't give him $40M a year because he'll necessarily be "worth" it, but because you're better off with him for $40 than nothing for $0. Some guys in some situations are just priceless

It is times like these when Rock and bucket are always absent.... I need a hotline I can call

The whole "Ricketts family in $700M of debt, haven't even started investing in Wrigley renovations" bit makes me skeptical of it all. Nothing will surprise me, of course

I still feel like Cubs don't actually have anything close to the money to sign Tanaka and are just making a bunch of noise to get their fans interested and think they're trying.

QUOTE (Downtown518 @ Jan 17, 2014 -> 11:08 AM) Jesse Sanchez ‏@JesseSanchezMLB Source tells me clubs have not heard back from Tanaka & nobody knows where they stand. Most had about 60 mins to make a case. No visits. https://twitter.com/JesseSanchezMLB/status/...225081196171265 This sounds more credible than anything else I've heard.

Sacramento currently has the 8th worst record in the league and has been playing better since the Gay trade. We have a shot at getting that pick this year

I would say that the difference between fWAR and bWAR is that bWAR tries to measure on-field results while fWAR tries to measure onfield talent. As usual, pitchers are the best way to look at this. fWAR rewards a pitcher for doing "pitching things" well -- striking people out, not walking people -- while bWAR rewards a pitcher for earned run prevention, which can be strongly influenced by luck, defensive talent, ballpark, etc. Throughout each measure, you can see how fWAR is about trying to find what a player added in a vacuum; that is, what would have happened if you took that player's efforts and put them in a different context. There's good conversation to this effect in the UZR primer. Does a player's batting average really tell you what happened? Is it a very useful representation of what he contributed to his team? Or is there a better way to do it, with less doubt about luck and the value of one event versus another? IMO, bWAR is not quite like batting average in its archaic-ness but it certainly is not worried about influences on production that are outside of the player's efforts, like luck.

for comparison, DRS: http://www.fangraphs.com/library/defense/drs/ For those wondering, fWAR uses DRS for catchers. A few other notes: DRS does not do adjustments for handedness of batter (and thus fielder position), ballpark (affects outfielders)

Another important difference between bWAR and fWAR - defense. bWAR uses Total Zone while FanGraphs uses UZR EDIT: Baseball-Reference switched to DRS from TZ, look to next post for information on DRS http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-fangraphs-uzr-primer/

Just unlocked, rooted, and flashed a ROM on my One earlier this week. I feel all grown up now. I agree that there are not a lot of beginner's resources and you'll have to get a minimum of adequacy with command prompt unless a kind developer has created a tool for your device

I'll add this resource to kick things off: The FanGraphs Glossary -- the real gems here are the full explanations of how each component of WAR is calculated for hitters and pitchers, which is also where you'll learn the most about things like wOBA and wRC+

This is why people want it to be called climate change. It won't always be warmer where you are, but it will always be more extreme

The dude used to throw 100mph. I'll be happy to give it a whirl if he can throw in the 90s again

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 14, 2014 -> 12:23 PM) Surkamp's minor and major league numbers are both very similar to Axelrod's. He won the pitching triple crown in AA. Axe has never done anything like that

I've been watching My Strange Addiction non-stop. I love it.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 14, 2014 -> 06:52 PM) YOU AND BALTA ARE NOW FRIENDS!

If GarPax are really trying to run Thibs out of town, they only have one choice: trade for JR Smith

I think Bobby is a really good person. After reading that story, I wish I could be at Soxfest just to shake his hand and let him know that we'll always be fans of his. Sounds like he has a ways to go in his return attempt, but if I'm the Sox I'd have no problem offering him resources to help with his rehab process with the understanding that he has a spot with us when he's ready.

You don't see a lot of 1Bmen as top prospects. And, ironically, if he is on one of these lists he'll be harmed by both his age (will be 27 soon) and lack of MiLB experience, which of course calls into question the wisdom of including him on such a list.