Right at the end of 2001, I had a long phone conversation with Rany Jazayerli, much of which was about the economics of baseball. Rany is my best friend on our staff, the guy who brought me into Baseball Prospectus. He is also one of the smartest people I know, which is why his viewpoints…
Japanese baseball performance should, in theory, be as translatable as performance from any baseball league in the United States. The process has had its challenges, though: the data is not as easy to find, and much of what is available is in a language and a character set that I can’t read. (I still don’t…