The Best of FanGraphs: June 23-27, 2014

by
June 28, 2014

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, purple for NotGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times and blue for Community.

Monday

The Value of Alex Gordon Not Using His Arm, by Jeff Sullivan
Some people just take longer to learn than others.

Rule 7.13: Protecting Catchers, Hurting The Game, by Mike Petriello
Mike had had enough. Later in the week, the rules changed. Say thank you to Mike.

Stick A Fork In Ben Zobrist, by Scott Strandberg
The jack of all positions is supposed to have a lot of trade value this month, but perhaps he shouldn’t have as much as we think.

Tuesday

David Price, Future Cardinal?, by Dave Cameron
It’s trade season, and Dave starts with a juicy idea.

Moustakas Clawing Way Out of Irrelevancy, by Michael Barr
“The bad news is he still really can’t hit a fastball.”

You Aren't a FanGraphs Member
It looks like you aren't yet a FanGraphs Member (or aren't logged in). We aren't mad, just disappointed.
We get it. You want to read this article. But before we let you get back to it, we'd like to point out a few of the good reasons why you should become a Member.
1. Ad Free viewing! We won't bug you with this ad, or any other.
2. Unlimited articles! Non-Members only get to read 10 free articles a month. Members never get cut off.
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4. Custom player page dashboards! Choose the player cards you want, in the order you want them.
5. One-click data exports! Export our projections and leaderboards for your personal projects.
6. Remove the photos on the home page! (Honestly, this doesn't sound so great to us, but some people wanted it, and we like to give our Members what they want.)
7. Even more Steamer projections! We have handedness, percentile, and context neutral projections available for Members only.
8. Get FanGraphs Walk-Off, a customized year end review! Find out exactly how you used FanGraphs this year, and how that compares to other Members. Don't be a victim of FOMO.
9. A weekly mailbag column, exclusively for Members.
10. Help support FanGraphs and our entire staff! Our Members provide us with critical resources to improve the site and deliver new features!
We hope you'll consider a Membership today, for yourself or as a gift! And we realize this has been an awfully long sales pitch, so we've also removed all the other ads in this article. We didn't want to overdo it.

Which Starters Have the Most Above-Average Pitches, by Eno Sarris
One name you might not expect to see on this list: Matt Shoemaker.

Using Statistics to Forecast the Death of Baseball, by Patrick Dubuque
It’s science.

A Physics Comparison of Great Throws From Years Past, by Eric Lang
Putting throws by Yoenis Cespedes, Rick Ankiel and others under the microscope.

Wednesday

NotGraphs: Only Congress Can Declare WAR, But What About FIP?, by Nathaniel Rakich
The Republicans are hackers.

The Mexican League Doesn’t Respect Contracts, by Nathaly Morga-Oregel
The Mexican League has a lot of tricks up its sleeve.

Thursday

Expected Run Differentials 2.0, by Dave Cameron
Incorporating BaseRuns!

What Else Would You Change, Fantasy Baseball Player?, by Nicholas Minnix
In the follow-up to his piece from last week, Nicholas puts you in the driver’s seat.

Mr. President? We Have Dave Cameron on the Line, by David G. Temple
“Something wrong with your eyes, Cameron?”

Friday

Jason McLeod on Scouting and Player Development, by David Laurila
The Cubs executive speaks to David about the mental game, evaluating a staff, on comps, his Cubs on the farm and much more in an expansive interview.

Athletics To Play In Oakland At Least 10 More Years — Or Not, by Wendy Thurm
At this point, the ballpark situation in Oakland is starting to resemble a storyline you’d see in Salem.





 

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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