The Best of FanGraphs: December 12-16, 2016

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December 17, 2016

Each week, we publish north of 100 posts on our various blogs. With this post, we hope to highlight 10 to 15 of them. You can read more on it here. The links below are color coded — green for FanGraphs, brown for RotoGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times and blue for Community Research.

MONDAY
Splits Leaderboards!, by Sean Dolinar
This is like when Spider-Man got upgraded to the Iron Spider armor.

iron_spider_cho

Sean is FanGraphs’ Tony Stark, is what I’m saying, but minus the destructive ego.

What Is the Baseball Equivalent of a Slam Dunk?, by Nicolas Stellini
The Albert Pujols off of Brad Lidge comp is perfect.

Comparing the Dexter Fowler and Adam Eaton Decisions, by Dave Cameron
Or, “why didn’t the Nationals just sign Fowler?” Dave explains.

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Mixing Fantasy & Reality: Strasburg Dumps His Slider & More, by Jeff Zimmerman
Is that going to be a problem? Jeff examines.

wERA: Rethinking Inherited Runners in the ERA Calculation, by Wesley Pasfield
A thoughtful, transparent attempt to improve on an age-old statistic.

TUESDAY
Falvey and Levine: New Leadership in Minnesota, by David Laurila
David talked to the new leaders of the Twins’ front office about impact players, trades, intangibles, their analytics department and plenty more.

Why Does the Home Crowd Boo Intentional Walks?, by Neil Weinberg
The off-season is built for fun research like this.

The Change: Change is Good, by Eno Sarris
Eno is moving on, except he isn’t. He gets an awesome new opportunity, and we still get to read him on the internet pages of FanGraphs. This is about as win-win as you can get, and I for one am super excited for Eno in his new venture.

WEDNESDAY
A Very Stupid Jose Altuve Hypothetical, by Jeff Sullivan
This hypothetical is quintessential Jeff Sullivan, and while the hypothetical might be stupid, the writing certainly isn’t.

The Case for Bringing Back Ladies’ Day, by Shakeia Taylor
In her Hardball Times debut, Shakeia wants teams to get ladies to games by promoting baseball.

Kinda Juiced Ball: Nonlinear COR, Homers, and Exit Velocity, by Andrew Dominijanni
This piece got positive mention from both David Kagan and Alan Nathan, and when they’re talking about a physics in baseball article, you should be reading it.

THURSDAY
MLB’s Other Shohei Otani Problem, by Dave Cameron
Alternate title – “MLB’s Got 99 Otani Problems But a Pitch Ain’t One.” I know, I know, but just let me have my bad/tired jokes, OK? It’s all I have.

The Updated xStats And Their Year To Year Correlations, by Andrew Perpetua
Make sure you bookmark this one.

We Good, Pham, by David Palardy
This one was already most of the way toward inclusion with just the title, but it’s also an interesting post that uses the new splits leaderboards, which just adds to its appeal.

FRIDAY
Lions and Tigers and Bears, Goodbye, by Chris Gigley
Chris examines the most recent minor league rebrands, which are making “outside the box” seem like a significant understatement.





 

Paul Swydan used to be the managing editor of The Hardball Times, a writer and editor for FanGraphs and a writer for Boston.com and The Boston Globe. Now, he owns The Silver Unicorn Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Acton, Mass. Follow him on Twitter @Swydan. Follow the store @SilUnicornActon.

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tz
8 years ago

The Best of PesäpalloGraphs December 12-16, 2016:

From the land that brought us Dasher, Dancer, Prancer et al. — Game 5 of 2016 Finnish Baseball championship series between Vimpelin Veto and Sotkamon Jymy.

(Note – broadcast is in Finnish. Turn on closed captioning and then, under Settings, auto-translation to English).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5j7LyF8mSM

3
YKnotDisco
8 years ago
Reply to  tz

Where are the “Hit it Here!” signs being held by fans standing in the RF creek?

2
tz
8 years ago
Reply to  YKnotDisco

I don’t know if they let fans there, since the creek is in play. Or if that’s an issue for them.

http://www.fangraphs.com/community/53-things-about-a-53-second-finnish-baseball-video/

0
YKnotDisco
8 years ago
Reply to  tz

That first video is where my comment derived from. (It should have read “near the creek” instead of “in the creek”) I remembered you posting it in the community section. You gave a hilarious breakdown of the action taking place.

1