Win a Free Copy of THT 2016!
Have you heard? The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2016 is now available for sale. You can check out the table of contents and read some excerpts from the book. When you finish that you can purchase it from our independent publishing platform, Createspace, in print form, or from Amazon in print form, and also digitally on Amazon for the Kindle.
But wait, there’s more! Because we’re giving folk, and since it’s the beginning of the holiday season and all, we want to give you a chance to win yourself a free copy of the book. So today and tomorrow (and yesterday), we’ll be running a trivia contest based on one of the articles in the book. The first person to post the correct answer in the comments will win a free physical copy of the book (sorry, no free Kindle version). It’s just that simple!
Today’s question comes to you from Peter Bonney’s article, “Who Watches the Watchers? Introducing Umpire Consistency Score,” where he, you know, introduces an umpire consistency score. You’ll have to read the article for the nuts and bolts of the metric, but it sets out to do just what it says. Bonney utilizes both raw UCS as well as UCS150, which is UCS (re-normalized) per 150 pitches (i.e. UCS per typical game). Toward the end of the piece, he busts out his whole leaderboard of umpires who worked from 2008-2015 and called at least 10,000 pitches. So the question before you today, dear reader, is this:
Can you name two of the top 10 umpires, as ranked by UCS150?
Note: If you name more than two umpires, your entry will be automatically discarded.
Good luck!
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.
Going out on a limb to guess that Angel Hernandez is not among the top 10…
Correct, though he isn’t as far down the list as I thought he would be.
Jim Joyce, Tim McClelland
You can win a free copy of the best blog ever composed about the Phillies!
It’s easy!
Google: Kevin Maitan FREE_AEC
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Jim Joyce & Dana DeMuth
Tim McClelland and Jim Reynolds
Vic Carapazza and rob drake
Vic Carapazza? I hope this was a joke…
Lance Barksdale and Laz Diaz
Tim Welke
Jerry Meals
Bill Welke and Jim Wolf
Dale Scott and Jim Joyce
Tim Welke and Dale Scott
Tim Welke and Jim Joyce
Joe West and John Hirshbeck
Tim McClendall and John Hirschbeck
Phill Cuzzi and Eric Cooper
Gary Cederstrom and Bill Welke
Alan Porter and Jim Joyce
Joe West, Jim Joyce
Phil Cuzzi
Ed Hickox
Jeff Nelson and Jim Reynolds
Jim Reynolds, John Hirschbeck
Welke and Cuzzi
Lance Barksdale and Eric Cooper
Ron Culpa, Tim Welke
CB Bucknor and Todd Tichenor
Barksdale and Cuzzi
Jerry Meals and Hunter Wendelstedt
Tim McClelland
Paul Schreiber
Tim Tschida and Tim McClelland
I just want to say that I love this username.
Barksdale and Guccione
Tom Woodring and Tim Timmons
Lance Barret, Quinn Walcott
Dale Scott
Tim mcclelland
Tim McClelland, Eric Cooper
Barksdale and McClelland
barksdale and gibson
Drake and Diaz
McClelland and Diaz
Jim Joyce and Jeff Nelson
Well hot dog, we have a wiener!!! Congrats to Yasser, and thanks to everyone for playing!
T Welke and J Joyce
Eric Coope, Jerry Layne
YUK and DUM.
(Does anyone else remember the umpires from NES Bases Loaded? Anybody? Aaahhh, 8-bit good times…)
http://img.youtube.com/vi/q7SfiEc-uhM/hqdefault.jpg
Eric Cooper and Cory Blaser
the last 4 digits of my social are 83 hunna
Vic Carapazza and Eric Cooper
Triple H and X-Pac
Jeff Nelson & John Hirschbeck