The last decade and a half has been good to us. Our little-read first annual (sans the St. Louis chapter) in 1996 spawned a best-selling series that's about to welcome its 17th installment. Our web presence began by publishing new pieces sporadically and has matured into a site that's updated daily with a back catalog well over 10,000 articles strong. The only downside to our prolific past is that being introduced (or introducing someone else) to BP now is a bit like starting Lost in season five. A new subscriber, or even one who has been around from the start, could be excused for wondering “How did they get here?”, “What did I miss?”, and “What do those numbers mean?” As Jack, Kate, & Co. discovered, in order to answer those questions (or, in their case, leave most of them annoyingly unanswered), we have to go back. We've tried to make our archives more accessible by freeing up our older articles and republishing selected pieces via The BP Wayback Machine, but now we're taking the next step by bringing the BP archives to your bookshelf, e-book reader, or hard drive.
With extensive input from Christina Kahrl, who knows a thing or two about BP's past, we've selected roughly 150 of the best articles BP has to offer, representing a comprehensive cross-section of the ground-breaking insight, astute analysis, and witty commentary that you've come to expect from us over the last 15 years. The collection features work by BP co-founders Clay Davenport, Gary Huckabay, Rany Jazayerli, Christina Kahrl, and Joe Sheehan, as well as popular alumni like Russell Carleton, Will Carroll, James Click, Dan Fox, Jonah Keri, David Laurila, Marc Normandin, Nate Silver, Michael Wolverton, and Keith Woolner, current columnists like Mike Fast, Kevin Goldstein, Steven Goldman, Jay Jaffe, Ben Lindbergh (third-person alert), Jason Parks, and Colin Wyers, and more.
We've divided the articles into nine themed sections. (Yes, as many sections as there are innings in a game. Go figure.) Once we'd done all our selecting and dividing, we realized that we had nearly 900 pages of content prepared, but we didn't want to leave anything out. Instead of leaving half the articles on the cutting-room floor or a trying to cram everything into one massive tome that would make the annual look like a takeout menu, we decided to publish Best of Baseball Prospectus in two soft-cover volumes. The first four sections appear in Volume One, while the latter five compose Volume Two, an arrangement that allows us to divide the material into a meaty 450 pages or so per book. All of the articles have been given a fresh edit, laid out in a design that's easy on the eyes (with headshots, since we know you only like us for our looks), and introduced with a blurb by the editor setting up what you're about to read.
Of course, as nice as it is to have some of BP's best work preserved in book form, we wouldn't expect you to dip into your baseball budget without some new content to sweeten the deal. In addition to my preface and forewords by friends of BP King Kaufman and Rob Neyer, we've also commissioned 11 essay-length chapter introductions and original articles by past and present BP authors distributed across the two books.
Both volumes will be available for purchase on Amazon.com in plenty of time for Christmas—late next week is our target—for $14.95 list price each. If you buy the matched set, you'll get free two-day shipping from Amazon. Our partners at Amazon generally offer our self-published books at a discount from list price, and we'll certainly let you know if they're discounting Best of BP.
As with all of our self-published books, PEV is also selling in the popular PDF document format—as always, without any DRM or crapware bundled in. If you buy the PDF, we don't have to print a book and send it to you, and we appreciate not having to do that. (Also, pricing a virtual product the same as a physical product is preposterous.) We'll be offering the PDF at $7.95 for each volume. We will also be making these books available in various e-book formats—stay tuned for an update on that.
So what does that $14.95 or $7.95 buy you? Here's what you get in each volume:
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Best of Baseball Prospectus: 1996-2011
Foreword by King Kaufman |
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Part 1 OFFENSE
15 articles |
Your guide, Jay Jaffe…
 …explains how and why we went from the numbers on the back of the baseball card to advanced stats like VORP and TAv |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 2 PITCHING
22 articles |
Your guide, Mike Fast…
 …asserts that the rumors of the demise of baseball analysis have been greatly exaggerated and offers a look at the next sabermetric frontiers |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 3 FIELDING
10 articles |
Your guide, Christina Kahrl…
 …explains how defensive analysis is baseball's white whale and how we might not even know when we've caught it |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 4 HISTORY
26 articles |
Your guide, Steven Goldman…
 …uses the story of Frankie Frisch and John McGraw to show that “Stats” and “Scouts” provide an incomplete picture without a third component, Story |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Plus an original article by Geoff Young, who examines the fascinating career of the man they called “Camera Eye,” Max Bishop |
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Best of Baseball Prospectus: 1996-2011
Foreword by Rob Neyer |
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Part 5 SABERMETRICS
13 articles |
Your guide, Colin Wyers…
 …explains how sabermetrics is and isn't like “real” science and why if you want to bring another baseball nerd into the world, you should buy your kid a breadboard |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 6 PROSPECTING
24 articles |
Your guide, Jason Parks…
 …relates the story of his scouting journey from message boards to back fields to Baseball Prospectus and beyond |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 7 POSTSEASON
13 articles |
Your guide, Tommy Bennett…
 …pinpoints what Cody Ross' brief burst of playoff heroics can tell us about the nature of postseason play |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 8 BUSINESS
11 articles |
Your guide, Jeff Euston…
 …explains that our national pastime is much more than just a game |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Part 9 EXTRA INNINGS
15 articles |
Your guide, Ken Funck…
 …spins a yarn about the mysterious agents who protect us from the creeping menace of mother's basement dwellers to kick off a miscellaneous section with selections from BP's lighter side |
And highlights from BP's past, including…
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Plus an original article by Gary Huckabay—his first new work for BP in over two years—who explains whether you'd really be better off working in baseball and what front-office jobs are actually like |
At its, well, best, a “Best Of” book offers a career-spanning collection that simultaneously functions as a fitting introduction for someone who's new to the material and a welcome refresher for someone who's seen it before. We believe Best of Baseball Prospectus does both, and we can't wait to share it with you starting next week.
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Or individuals can find some bookbinder that would take on the work at a reasonable rate and have at it.
I love the smell of buckram in the morning. Smells like... library.
Anyway, random thought coming....Richard Bergstrom mentioned in a post a couple days ago about the exclusivity of content at BP right now. I'd like to point out that one of the things exclusive to BP is the comments section. I remember when the comments were first added, that I thought it would be a useless feature, because comments sections usually are.
But BP is different. I enjoy reading the comments because I do learn from them, be it about people discussing their favorite team in more detail than I could follow, debates about the merits of research articles, or diatrabes about the socialist-fascist nature of the comment rating system.
Since 1998 (or 1997, I really can't remember), BP has been like an oasis on the internet for me. Yes, for the baseball content, but also for the community. I feel like I could sit down at a bar and have a beer with Colin Wyers or KG, but also with dianagram or Richard Bergstrom or dodgerken.
So, please Richard, stick around. I would miss you around here. And I'd wager that you'd miss us too.
If I post a comment today, I sure don't want to have remember which article it is on so I can check for feedback and keep the dialog going.
I do wish there was a bulletin board system or something similar where we could start our own threads, including a way to refer to some of the other people on here like dianagram who have active baseball blogs, but in general, I do come here for the comments and interaction (though since I upgraded to Windows 7 at work, I've had some compatibility issues with commenting, so it's probably an issue on our end).
That being said, I'm flattered that you would miss me since I do respect you highly. I definitely appreciate the thought you put into this post. As well, there are others on BP, both writers and members of the community (RAWagman is also one of my favorites), that I really enjoy speaking with. I guess I see an article posted for an ESPN audience and I'm not sure what to say since it seems "dumbed down", or I see a repost of something from the Wayback Machine, remember reading the original article, and just have nothing new to contribute besides a reminisce. I kinda get concerned what I am paying for, thoguh as I tried to indicate, nowhere near agitated enough to raise a s_storm and cancel out of spite screaming "Bring back _blank_!" I won't have to make a decision until next July and in general, the subscription fee is low enough and the value is high enough where it's not something I wring my hands over. I was just trying to indicate that things are different and somehow (and maybe it's just on my end?) I feel there's less material for me to engage with. I'll also admit that I tend to stick to certain writers and, well, some of those writers aren't here anymore. Maybe I just need to give some of the others a bit more of a chance. There's one BP writer in particular that I keep trying to like, keep knowing I should like and keep failing miserably at and I'm not sure why. Unfortunately, I'm not a podcast person so that avenue I'll never end up latching on to.
So, to reiterate with a less random thought, I deeply appreciate your concern and as of right now, I'm not going anywhere. Take my previous posting as a bit of a confused minirant since I'm at least here for another half a year and, yes, most likely, afterwards as well.
On a side note, it's funny how I've been on here for at least four years and get envious of those with lower customer IDs than mine ;)
P.S. A bulletin board would make it much easier to arrange get-togethers over beer. I know there hasn't been a pizza feed out in Denver since after the Rockies went to the World Series either.
Also, I don't know what's on Jason Parks' head, but it fits in with my impression of Mr. Parks as awesome.
I cannot @$%#ing wait to get my hands on this book. My knowledge is meager, and my hunger to supplement it and give it greater context grows by the minute. I just wish I could grow a Jaffestache--I lack the upper lip and facial structure to pull it off. It's a shame, but then if I could it would denigrate the spectacular, unique nature of the Jaffestache.
You guys have been at the forefront of the analytical revolution and were there pretty much from the start in terms of having a presence on the web, so I think it would be a fun read.
Another idea would be to compare predictions to actual outcomes as well. Interesting idea, but the execution will be a challenge.
...but I loved BP Idol. It was kicked off right after I started seriously reading the site and aside from exposing some very good writers (Ken, Brian, etc), it was a really enjoyable format that gave me a reason to invest my time. It really is what kept me coming back as I became familiar with the everyday authors.
It's been nice to see pretty much all of those people in BP Idol still writing about baseball, either here or elsewhere. As an aside, that competition was the first time I heard about Colin and started going to Tango's website.
On the comments thing, +/- has always been a bit of a stickler. I'm a bit curious what happened to the "NEW" tags that used to accompany comments that appeared since I last read an article.
I also think a collection of various comments - the most accurate, the least accurate, the most amusing, the most prescient, etc - would be a great thing to add.
"Helton missed 14 games in late April and early May with what was diagnosed as `acute terminal ileitis,` or, in layman`s terms, one helluva stomachache"
My second favorite, Corey Patterson, also from 2007:
"The idea that the average player improves through his twenties to age 27 is mistaken, as that trend really only applies to the average major leaguer. What distinguishes a typical major leaguer from a typical minor leaguer is the ability to learn and improve."
I think we'd need more people to commit first, though.
As long as I don't have to explain to my wife that I already own 95% of the content these two volumes already contain, I'm safe. Shhh....
2. I'm surprised by some people's expectation of comments. Good comments drives out bad comments. Fools are intimidated by an intelligent discussion, and BPro subscribers have proven that to be the case for the most part.
My absolute favorite sabermetrics book is BP's "Baseball Between the Numbers" I re-read parts of it every off season. It was published in March 2006. Any chance of an update or follow-up book?
We're finishing it up right now and will be submitting for printing very soon.
Thanks.
But wait...
Kevin Goldstein's prospect notes and minor league notes (wish I had time for the podcasts)
Jay Jaffe
Colin Wyers
Jason Parks
These guys are less than sucky.
I'm not quite ready to say that BP hasn't peaked in terms of its roster of talent, but speaking of talent, there's still plenty here. I'm hopeful that we won't be revisiting the PECOTA fiasco of last year. Furthermore, I'm I look forward to the 2012 output of a talented crop of writers.
Oh, and these books are a no-brainer purchase. I do have to ask however: why the picture? Those books look incredible.
But once I realized there was still tons of great content for a low price, I re-upped and I always will.
I think we've got plenty of material for Volume 3 if people like 1 and 2.
This could probably use some updating...
However, the price is listed as $16.95 per, and when I was on the cusp of completing my order, I noticed that the previously-promised "free two-day shipping" was not offered.
Will this be updated soon, or did Amazon make some changes when the books were finally posted?