Watching Baseball Smarter

Author : Zack Hample
Publisher : Vintage
Page : 272 pages
File Size : 52,8 Mb
Release : 2008-12-24
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780307498601

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Watching Baseball Smarter by Zack Hample Pdf

This smart and funny fan’s guide to baseball explains the ins and outs of pitching, hitting, running, and fielding, while offering insider trivia and anecdotes that will appeal to anyone—whether you're a major league couch potato, life-long season ticket-holder, or a beginner. What is the difference between a slider and a curveball? At which stadium did “The Wave” first make an appearance? How do some hitters use iPods to improve their skills? Which positions are never played by lefties? Why do some players urinate on their hands? Combining the narrative voice and attitude of Michael Lewis with the compulsive brilliance of Schott’s Miscellany, Watching Baseball Smarter will increase your understanding and enjoyment of the sport–no matter what your level of expertise. Features an glossary of baseball slang, an appendix of important baseball stats, and an appendix of uniform numbers.

Author : Jerry Remy,Corey Sandler
Publisher : Insiders' Guide
Page : 436 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2005-03
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 0762737492

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Watching Baseball by Jerry Remy,Corey Sandler Pdf

A fascinating look at the game within the game by All-Star second baseman andRed Sox broadcaster Remy with professional journalist Sandler.

Author : Keith Law
Publisher : HarperCollins
Page : 304 pages
File Size : 53,8 Mb
Release : 2017-04-25
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780062490254

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Smart Baseball by Keith Law Pdf

Predictably Irrational meets Moneyball in ESPN veteran writer and statistical analyst Keith Law’s iconoclastic look at the numbers game of baseball, proving why some of the most trusted stats are surprisingly wrong, explaining what numbers actually work, and exploring what the rise of Big Data means for the future of the sport. For decades, statistics such as batting average, saves recorded, and pitching won-lost records have been used to measure individual players’ and teams’ potential and success. But in the past fifteen years, a revolutionary new standard of measurement—sabermetrics—has been embraced by front offices in Major League Baseball and among fantasy baseball enthusiasts. But while sabermetrics is recognized as being smarter and more accurate, traditionalists, including journalists, fans, and managers, stubbornly believe that the "old" way—a combination of outdated numbers and "gut" instinct—is still the best way. Baseball, they argue, should be run by people, not by numbers.? In this informative and provocative book, teh renowned ESPN analyst and senior baseball writer demolishes a century’s worth of accepted wisdom, making the definitive case against the long-established view. Armed with concrete examples from different eras of baseball history, logic, a little math, and lively commentary, he shows how the allegiance to these numbers—dating back to the beginning of the professional game—is firmly rooted not in accuracy or success, but in baseball’s irrational adherence to tradition. While Law gores sacred cows, from clutch performers to RBIs to the infamous save rule, he also demystifies sabermetrics, explaining what these "new" numbers really are and why they’re vital. He also considers the game’s future, examining how teams are using Data—from PhDs to sophisticated statistical databases—to build future rosters; changes that will transform baseball and all of professional sports.

Author : Zack Hample
Publisher : Anchor
Page : 370 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2011-03-08
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780307475459

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The Baseball by Zack Hample Pdf

The Baseball is a salute to the ball, filled with insider trivia, anecdotes, and generations of ball-induced insanity—from Zack Hample, the bestselling author of Watching Baseball Smarter • Which Hall of Famer once caught a ball dropped from an airplane? • Why do balls get stamped with invisible ink? • What’s the best ticket to buy for catching a foul ball? • Which part of the ball once came from dog food companies? • How could a 10,000-year-old glacier help a pitcher grip the ball? In this enlightening, entertaining, and often wildly funny book, Zack Hample shares ballpark legends and lore, explores the history of the baseball souvenir craze, and also details the evolution of the ball. Finally, Hample—who has snagged more than 4,600 balls from 48 different major league stadiums—offers up his secret methods for snagging your own ball from major league games. Features a ballhawk glossary, profiles of legendary ballhawks, top 10 lists, and black-and-white photos throughout.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 12 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 1943
Category : Agriculture
ISBN : MINN:30000008500914

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Circular by Anonim Pdf

Author : Leighton L. Smith
Publisher : Dorrance Publishing
Page : 262 pages
File Size : 43,6 Mb
Release : 2020-10-08
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9781648044137

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How to Play Smart Baseball by Leighton L. Smith Pdf

How to Play Smart Baseball By: Leighton L. Smith How to Play Smart Baseball is a user-friendly guide to playing baseball that anyone can use. It gives practical suggestions on how to play baseball better, including ideas and tactics for managers, coaches and players of all positions. Using real-life examples from throughout the history of the sport, How to Play Smart Baseball advocates a smarter, more engaging way to play the game while memorizing some of the best players and plays of all time. Amateur of professional, all readers can use this book as a companion to enhance their experience in watching, discussing, or playing the game.

Author : Jason Turbow,Michael Duca
Publisher : Anchor
Page : 306 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2011-03-22
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780307278623

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The Baseball Codes by Jason Turbow,Michael Duca Pdf

An insider’s look at baseball’s unwritten rules, explained with examples from the game’s most fascinating characters and wildest historical moments. Everyone knows that baseball is a game of intricate regulations, but it turns out to be even more complicated than we realize. All aspects of baseball—hitting, pitching, and baserunning—are affected by the Code, a set of unwritten rules that governs the Major League game. Some of these rules are openly discussed (don’t steal a base with a big lead late in the game), while others are known only to a minority of players (don’t cross between the catcher and the pitcher on the way to the batter’s box). In The Baseball Codes, old-timers and all-time greats share their insights into the game’s most hallowed—and least known—traditions. For the learned and the casual baseball fan alike, the result is illuminating and thoroughly entertaining. At the heart of this book are incredible and often hilarious stories involving national heroes (like Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays) and notorious headhunters (like Bob Gibson and Don Drysdale) in a century-long series of confrontations over respect, honor, and the soul of the game. With The Baseball Codes, we see for the first time the game as it’s actually played, through the eyes of the players on the field. With rollicking stories from the past and new perspectives on baseball’s informal rulebook, The Baseball Codes is a must for every fan.

Author : Dan Formosa,Paul Hamburger
Publisher : The Experiment, LLC
Page : 385 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 2023-04-25
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9781615199556

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Baseball Field Guide, Fourth Edition: An In-Depth Illustrated Guide to the Complete Rules of Baseball (Fourth) by Dan Formosa,Paul Hamburger Pdf

A great overview for novices and a precise reference guide for devoted fans! Admit it: Even if you’re a die-hard fan of our national pastime, sometimes an umpire’s call can be baffling. And for newer fans, Major League Baseball’s nuanced rules—developed and revised over many decades—can be downright perplexing. Now updated throughout with the latest changes, including specifications about the universal designated hitter and limits on defensive shifts, the Baseball Field Guide lays out every rule in plain English. You’ll learn to answer all these questions and more: Do you know the twenty-two ways a pitcher can be charged with a balk? Can you list all seven ways a batter can safely get to first base? Obstruction or interference—who’s at fault when things get rough? What are the rules that apply before and after a game? What happens when spectators are the ones who misbehave? How well do you understand the infamous Infield Fly Rule (and why does it exist)? This is the clearest explanation anywhere of the rules of baseball. Designed for quick and intuitive searches, this entertaining reference will help you understand every aspect of the game and add to your enjoyment of the sport.

Author : Ben Lindbergh,Travis Sawchik
Publisher : Basic Books
Page : 428 pages
File Size : 42,7 Mb
Release : 2019-06-04
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9781541698956

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The MVP Machine by Ben Lindbergh,Travis Sawchik Pdf

Move over, Moneyball -- this New York Times bestseller examines major league baseball's next cutting-edge revolution: the high-tech quest to build better players. As bestselling authors Ben Lindbergh and Travis Sawchik reveal in The MVP Machine, the Moneyball era is over. Fifteen years after Michael Lewis brought the Oakland Athletics' groundbreaking team-building strategies to light, every front office takes a data-driven approach to evaluating players, and the league's smarter teams no longer have a huge advantage in valuing past performance. Lindbergh and Sawchik's behind-the-scenes reporting reveals: How undersized afterthoughts José Altuve and Mookie Betts became big sluggers and MVPs How polarizing pitcher Trevor Bauer made himself a Cy Young contender How new analytical tools have overturned traditional pitching and hitting techniques How a wave of young talent is making MLB both better than ever and arguably worse to watch Instead of out-drafting, out-signing, and out-trading their rivals, baseball's best minds have turned to out-developing opponents, gaining greater edges than ever by perfecting prospects and eking extra runs out of older athletes who were once written off. Lindbergh and Sawchik take us inside the transformation of former fringe hitters into home-run kings, show how washed-up pitchers have emerged as aces, and document how coaching and scouting are being turned upside down. The MVP Machine charts the future of a sport and offers a lesson that goes beyond baseball: Success stems not from focusing on finished products, but from making the most of untapped potential.

Author : Jonah Keri
Publisher : ESPN
Page : 274 pages
File Size : 49,7 Mb
Release : 2011-03-08
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780345517654

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The Extra 2% by Jonah Keri Pdf

What happens when three financial industry whiz kids and certified baseball nuts take over an ailing major league franchise and implement the same strategies that fueled their success on Wall Street? In the case of the 2008 Tampa Bay Rays, an American League championship happens—the culmination of one of the greatest turnarounds in baseball history. In The Extra 2%, financial journalist and sportswriter Jonah Keri chronicles the remarkable story of one team’s Cinderella journey from divisional doormat to World Series contender. When former Goldman Sachs colleagues Stuart Sternberg and Matthew Silverman assumed control of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in 2005, it looked as if they were buying the baseball equivalent of a penny stock. But the incoming regime came armed with a master plan: to leverage their skill at trading, valuation, and management to build a model twenty-first-century franchise that could compete with their bigger, stronger, richer rivals—and prevail. Together with “boy genius” general manager Andrew Friedman, the new Rays owners jettisoned the old ways of doing things, substituting their own innovative ideas about employee development, marketing and public relations, and personnel management. They exorcized the “devil” from the team’s nickname, developed metrics that let them take advantage of undervalued aspects of the game, like defense, and hired a forward-thinking field manager as dedicated to unconventional strategy as they were. By quantifying the game’s intangibles—that extra 2% that separates a winning organization from a losing one—they were able to deliver to Tampa Bay something that Billy Beane’s “Moneyball” had never brought to Oakland: an American League pennant. A book about what happens when you apply your business skills to your life’s passion, The Extra 2% is an informative and entertaining case study for any organization that wants to go from worst to first.

Author : David Halberstam
Publisher : Open Road Media
Page : 525 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2012-12-18
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9781453286128

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October 1964 by David Halberstam Pdf

The “compelling” New York Times bestseller by the Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, capturing the 1964 World Series between the Yankees and Cardinals (Newsweek). David Halberstam, an avid sports writer with an investigative reporter’s tenacity, superbly details the end of the fifteen-year reign of the New York Yankees in October 1964. That October found the Yankees going head-to-head with the St. Louis Cardinals for the World Series pennant. Expertly weaving the narrative threads of both teams’ seasons, Halberstam brings the major personalities on the field—from switch-hitter Mickey Mantle to pitcher Bob Gibson—to life. Using the teams’ subcultures, Halberstam also analyzes the cultural shifts of the sixties. The result is a unique blend of sports writing and cultural history as engrossing as it is insightful. This ebook features an extended biography of David Halberstam.

Author : Robert Mankoff
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
Page : 148 pages
File Size : 43,5 Mb
Release : 2012-04-27
Category : Humor
ISBN : 9781118362242

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The New Yorker Book of Baseball Cartoons by Robert Mankoff Pdf

A loving look at the old ball game, from the cartoonists at The New Yorker America's national pastime engages fans and fanatics across the country and around the world. Across the magazine's eight decades, the artists at The New Yorker have captured the emotional essence of the game, and The New Yorker Book of Baseball Cartoons, Second Edition brings an all-star lineup of cartooning greats together in one delightful collection. Collects over 100 drawings that present a playful view of the all-American sport Includes an introduction by Michael Crawford Features classic cartoons by New Yorker legends from Charles Addams to Jack Ziegler Selected by Robert Mankoff, acclaimed cartoonist and cartoon editor of The New Yorker, The New Yorker Book of Baseball Cartoons is a home run for baseball fans of all ages.

Author : Keith Law
Publisher : HarperCollins
Page : 258 pages
File Size : 41,5 Mb
Release : 2020-04-21
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9780062942746

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The Inside Game by Keith Law Pdf

In this groundbreaking book, Keith Law, baseball writer for The Athletic and author of the acclaimed Smart Baseball, offers an era-spanning dissection of some of the best and worst decisions in modern baseball, explaining what motivated them, what can be learned from them, and how their legacy has shaped the game. For years, Daniel Kahneman’s iconic work of behavioral science Thinking Fast and Slow has been required reading in front offices across Major League Baseball. In this smart, incisive, and eye-opening book, Keith Law applies Kahneman’s ideas about decision making to the game itself. Baseball is a sport of decisions. Some are so small and routine they become the building blocks of the game itself—what pitch to throw or when to swing away. Others are so huge they dictate the future of franchises—when to make a strategic trade for a chance to win now, or when to offer a millions and a multi-year contract for a twenty-eight-year-old star. These decisions have long shaped the behavior of players, managers, and entire franchises. But as those choices have become more complex and data-driven, knowing what’s behind them has become key to understanding the sport. This fascinating, revelatory work explores as never before the essential question: What were they thinking? Combining behavioral science and interviews with executives, managers, and players, Keith Law analyzes baseball’s biggest decision making successes and failures, looking at how gambles and calculated risks of all sizes and scales have shaped the sport, and how the game’s ongoing data revolution is rewriting decades of accepted decision making. In the process, he explores questions that have long been debated, from whether throwing harder really increases a player’s risk of serious injury to whether teams actually “overvalue” trade prospects. Bringing his analytical and combative style to some of baseball’s longest running debates, Law deepens our knowledge of the sport in this entertaining work that is both fun and deeply informative.

Author : Zack Hample
Publisher : Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 1999
Category : Baseball
ISBN : 0689823312

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How to Snag Major League Baseballs by Zack Hample Pdf

The author, who has acquired more than 1000 baseballs at major league baseball games, offers advice on the many ways to get balls at games.

Author : Zack Hample
Publisher : Vintage
Page : 68 pages
File Size : 43,7 Mb
Release : 2014-10-14
Category : Sports & Recreation
ISBN : 9781101910917

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The Art of Snag by Zack Hample Pdf

From Zack Hample’s The Baseball, this is the definitive, always-entertaining, never-fail guide to successfully snagging baseballs at Major League games. Luck—or hard work and skill? Zack Hample has caught more than 7,600 baseballs from the stands of 51 major league stadiums. His snags include Mike Trout’s first career home run and Barry Bonds’s 724th; the last homer hit by a Met at Shea Stadium; and a regular old Cubs-Reds contest from which Hample walked away with 36 balls. You, too, can do what Zack does, whether you’re at Opening Day batting practice or Game 7 of the World Series. From a baseball expert and skilled raconteur, “The Art of Snag” tells you what to wear, how to talk, where to go, and what exactly you need to do to become the (Skillful? Just plain prepared? Either way, legal) proud owner of a Major League baseball. An eBook short.