Diamond Data Dive
George Springer's basestealing struggles probably just a blip
Why did such an explosive athlete lead the league in getting caught stealing?
Do more home runs mean more wins?
Home runs are exciting, but do they actually help? A look at the relationship in 2016.
Trout one of the all-time greats, as you know
The star Angels outfielder is among the best of the best in the history of the game at the fresh age of 25.
Some streaks are pretty impressive
Aroldis Chapman, Zach Britton, and Rich Hill all have something in common.
One player helped us outrun the hedonic treadmill
As baseball fans, we get used to incredible players really, really quickly, but one player managed to overcome our disinterest time and time again.
Throwing hard but not well: what makes velo good?
Fast fastballs are fun to watch, and while they're generally correlated with success they certainly don't guarantee it. What distinguishes the good hard-throwers from the bad?
Shift Happens: Measuring effectiveness with wBABIP
Instead of using BABIP, we should be using wOBA to determine the results of the shift.
Statcast data: Added velocity leaderboards
After this week's release of Statcast data, take a look at which pitchers achieve the largest differences between their actual velocity and perceived velocity.
Sonny Gray and other pitching extension candidates
After a Spring Training strangely devoid of pre-arbitration extensions, there's still time for some early season moves. These pitchers most closely match past extension recipients.
MLB Opening Day payrolls show Royals have surprising salary parity
But so do some other large market teams.
Black holes: the terrible positions of the past decade
Seeking patterns in which positions have most often been actively bad over the last ten years.
The 2015 BACON Leaderboard
What's better than BABIP for hitters? It's BACON, which could be part of the way we can get a picture of which hitters make the most useful contact.
Different players, same WAR
Taking a look at how different players in different positions and with different styles can finish with the same WAR total in a season.
Every team in a division: Who has done it?
Six players in MLB history have appeared in games for all five teams in a current division. Who are they?
2016 college baseball preview
The NCAA baseball season gets into full swing this weekend. We give predictions across all three divisions, and look for the MLB players most like top draft prospects.
The adoption of new strategies is faster now than ever before
Framing has become a standard part of baseball in an exceptionally small period of time. How does that compare to previous major shifts in the game?
We'll have robot quality umps by 2059
Umpiring, like so much else in life, is a young man's game.
How manager positioning can affect player numbers
Bryce Harper: center fielder. Manny Machado: shortstop. David Ortiz: first baseman. These alternate universes are closer than we think, and perhaps more kind to some of the game's players.
PetCo isn't the pitcher's paradise it used to be
The 2013 fence move, among other things, has precipitated a boost of home runs in San Diego.
The first pick in the draft does not equal a star
When picking first in the draft, generally you'd think that you are getting a player who is a cut above the rest.
Revisiting Carlos Martinez's starter conversion
Before the season, the odds were against Martinez increasing his strikeout rate while moving to the rotation. He did it anyway.
The Angels are wasting Mike Trout
Other teams with similar superstars have done far more.
Which WAR you use can affect your perception
The two most popular strains of Wins Above Replacement, FanGraphs WAR and Baseball-Reference WAR, have noticeable differences in their formulas - which players saw the largest swings in value due to those differences?
Statcast scraper and visualizations
Quick examples of visualizations of Statcast data, and a script to get the raw data for yourself
The first publicly-available raw Statcast Data
For 37 games at the start of the season, MLB released raw Statcast data. Here's what those data look like, and where to find them.
Reviewing this year's Rule 5 Draft
Was the 2015 Rule 5 Draft already the greatest in major league history?
The impact of managerial mistakes
It's easy, especially in the playoffs, to critique managers for their bad decisions (of which there are many). It's worth remembering just how little those mistakes tend to matter.
Madison Bumgarner: Shadow MVP candidate?
Could Madison Bumgarner be worth consideration on the MVP ballot, despite being outclassed on the Cy Young front? (Probably not, but still!)
The Twins aren't good at adding external talent
It's really hard to steal good talent away from other teams. Especially if you're the Twins.
The new Ben Zobrist is not who you would expect
After years of searching, have we finally found the spiritual successor to sabermetric darling Ben Zobrist? If so, it was not who we would have expected.
2015 playoff teams and the use of analytics
The role of analytics in baseball has been increasing in recent years, and this year's postseason appears to be full of some of the most analytically-minded teams in the game.
Infielders vs. outfielders: Taking the extra base
One of those rabbit hole investigations specifically relating to who is better at taking the extra base.