The Best of FanGraphs: March 31-April 4, 2014

If you missed the inaugural post of The Best Of FanGraphs, you can do so here. In case you don’t feel like clicking through though, here is how this post is structured:

We’ll pull from the whole FanGraphs family, picking 10-15 stories that we feel you really should read before the week draws to a close. The links are color coded — green for FanGraphs, burnt sienna for RotoGraphs, purple for NotGraphs, dark red for The Hardball Times and blue for Community. They are listed in this order as well in each day, just for the sake of consistency.

Monday

How Yasmani Grandal Stole Third Base, by Jeff Sullivan
Jeff has a unique ability to make unique baseball events look even more amazing, and this article is a perfect example.

The Smithers-Burns Question, by Bradley Woodrum
A thorough and entertaining analysis of the best Simpsons’ question you never knew you wanted the answer to.

Tuesday

How Much Does Age Matter for Closers?, by Eno Sarris
Expanding on a few recent studies, Eno finds that closers — on the whole — are older than the average pitcher. But does that matter?

You Are Not Welcome at Marlins Park, Dan Marino, by David G. Temple
No, you shut up.

The Physics of the Cutoff, by David Kagan
Here, David shows how baseball players double as experimental physicists.

Pitch Count Trends – Why Managers Remove Starting Pitchers, by Brandon N
In this very in-depth piece, Brandon explores the consequences of allowing an average starting pitcher to pitch further into a game.

Wednesday

Home Field Advantage and Our New Game Odds, by Dave Cameron
If you don’t mind me saying, our new game odds are pretty spectacular. Here, Dave shows you why.

Nickname Seeks Player: “Big Data”, by Mike Bates
Since Dayn Perry is too busy drinking his homemade moonshine to post at NotGraphs these days, Mike picks up the mantle for the ever-popular Nickname Seeks Player series. You can vote on the nominees here.

Thursday

Mike Trout, When It’s All Said and Done, by Tony Blengino
Putting together a peer group for Trout is every bit as hard as it sounds.

Kicking Rocks: Fantasy Darwinism, by Howard Bender
In the final edition of Kicking Rocks at RotoGraphs, Howard isn’t quite ready to give up on the Jumpers.

Friday

Identify Can’t-Miss Prospects Using This One Weird Trick, by Carson Cistulli
Carson continues his insightful series of quantifying scouting reports.

Getting the Most Out of Your Spreadsheets, by Scott Spratt
Scott has some advice on how to achieve better results.