Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five Part Six First, let’s recap the complete Top 40 lists for each publication, along with the grade for each player: Baseball Prospectus Baseball America John Sickels 1. Nick Johnson 1 1. Rick Ankiel 6 1. Corey Patterson 5 2. Rick Ankiel 6 2. Pat Burrell…
Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five While there was significant agreement between our Top 40 Prospects list of a year ago and the Top Prospect lists made out by John Sickels and Baseball America, there was some discord as well. Both Sickels and BA had 14 players in their own Top…
Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Now that we’ve released this season’s Top 40 Prospects list, we’re evaluating our list from a year ago to see what we can learn. As we did last season, we will compare our ranking of each player with the ranking given to them by two premier publications,…
Part One Part Two Part Three Now that we’ve released this season’s Top 40 Prospects list, it is time to return to a tradition we started last season, to objectively evaluate our list from a year ago and see what we can learn. As we did last season, we will compare our ranking of each…
Part One Part Two Now that we’ve released this season’s Top 40 Prospects list, it is time to return to a tradition we started last season, to objectively evaluate our list from a year ago and see what we can learn. As we did last season, we will compare our ranking of each player with…
Part One Now that we’ve released this season’s Top 40 Prospects list, it is time to return to a tradition we started last season, to objectively evaluate our list from a year ago and see what we can learn. As we did last season, we will compare our ranking of each player with the ranking…
Now that we’ve released this season’s Top 40 Prospects list, it is time to return to a tradition we started last season, to objectively evaluate our list from a year ago and see what we can learn. As we did last season, we will compare our ranking of each player with the ranking given to…
It happens every year. Every year I find some way to believe. Every winter I shed my analyst’s glasses and look at my Kansas City Royals through the eyes of a fan. A fan looking for a ray of hope. A fan willing to overlook holes at half a dozen positions. A fan willing to…
Four years ago, the Cardinals had their hands around the Braves’ collective neck and let the series slip away. Don’t think that Tony LaRussa has forgotten. Darryl Kile wasn’t with St. Louis in 1996, but he has his own motivation for revenge: he gave up just two hits and drove in a run against Greg…
First off, a nod to readers Paul Drye and Stephen Roney, who both took me up on my triple-dog-dare from last week. Referencing Dazzy Vance‘s strikeouts and Babe Ruth‘s homers, I challenged readers to find another instance in which one player so thoroughly dominated his league in any significant category. Both Drye and Roney rose…
It’s good to be back. It’s good to be anywhere but within the clutches of the Russ Branyan Fan Club, actually. These were no benevolent captors, let me tell you. You don’t know pain until you’ve been forced to watch every one of Rey Ordonez‘s 2,212 career plate appearances. I tried to put on a…
Rick Ankiel is living up to the hype. With his performance Monday night, he lowered his ERA to an impressive 4.01 and, more impressively, has now struck out 130 batters in just 119 innings pitched. To put that in perspective, 78 pitchers in history have struck out at least a man an inning while qualifying…
Just read your "Doctoring the Numbers" piece on the sucking Rockies. It would be good to see how non-Rockies teams fare on road trips. Perhaps fatigue, stinky underwear, the cumulative effects of restaurant food or some other aspect that builds over a road trip makes all teams hit significantly worse later in a road trip….
Theories on how altitude makes Coors Field such a great hitters’ park abound, as do theories as to why Rockies’ hitters seem to do so poorly on the road. The theory we like is that their hitters simply suck, but not everyone sees it that way. Colorado third baseman Jeff Cirillo had this to say…
The Era of Offense has not barred scrubs from the party. The last eight years are not only remarkable for 70 homers and 400 total bases and league ERAs approaching 5.00. The little guys have gotten in the act as well, putting together some of the greatest September callups and fluke seasons of all time….