Banzai Babe Ruth: Baseball, Espionage, and Assassination during the 1934 Tour of Japan is a new book by Robert. K. Fitts released earlier this month. I was fortunate enough to receive a copy for review from the publisher.

This book was tough to put down, mainly because of the subtitle: unlike most other baseball books, this one is a narrative that provides a detailed account of the complex political situation in the years before and after the tour of a major-league All-Star team in Japan in 1934. As tensions between Japan and western powers had grown in the 1920s and 30s, many hoped this series of exhibition games would serve to lower the barrier between Japan and the U.S. While many felt after the fact this goal had been achieved, by the 1940s it was clear that peace had not been achieved. We now know that the bombing of Pearl Harbor nevertheless occurred in 1941, leading to a prolonged world war and the devastation of Japan.

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Bobby Valentine is near the top of the list of guys who have managed the most major league games without ever finishing in first place. Could Valentine eventually climb to the very top of the list? It’s hard to imagine his being allowed to manage the additional five full seasons he would need without finishing first at least once. Unless he wins a World Series as a wild card, which is certainly within the realm of possibility. Bobby will presumably pass Frank Robinson for number 2 on this list around the end of May of this upcoming season, and with Jack McKeon and Jim Riggleman out of the current managing ranks, Bobby will have that #2 spot to himself for a long time — unless he can get off the list entirely with an AL East championship. The “leaders” in this category are listed after the jump. Continue reading →

Mel Ott, along with Bobby Orr, Ernie Els and Brian Eno, is a core member of the Hall of Fame of Crossword Puzzle Answers. The Polo Grounds had one of the most evocative names for a ballpark in all of baseball history. Together, Ott and the Polo Grounds (which was a ten- or fifteen-minute walk from Yankee Stadium) produced the greatest combination of home run hitter and home park that the major leagues has ever seen. The stats to prove it are after the jump. Continue reading →

Inspire by reader Kenny, I ask if anybody can recall multiple instances of any of the following events happening in the same game:

(a) a no-hitter
(b) a triple-play
(c) A squeeze bunt that scores a run
(d) a successful steal of home plate
(e) an inside-the-park home run
(f) hitting for the cycle

Maybe we can start with lists of each specific event and then see if any of the games match up?

JRoll, in all likelihood making an out / Icon SMI

Jimmy Rollins makes a ton of outs.

For starters, here are the NL leaders for outs over the last 11 seasons:

Rollins has led in 4 of those 11 years. To be fair, he also led in AB all of those years so he had the most opportunity to make outs. (Although, to play devil’s advocate, if he had walked more, he wouldn’t have had so many ABs…)

But this isn’t the whole story–click through for more. Continue reading →

In the final installment of WAR leaders by position since 1961, we look at pitchers and catchers. As with the earlier posts, the methodology is to identify the leader in cumulative bWAR over 5-year periods for players appearing in a designated position for at least 75% of their games. For pitchers, this means that a pitcher must appear in either a starting or relieving role for 75% of their games to be included on the leader board.

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We appear to be having some site issues with intermittent slow loading and/or downtime. I am investigating.

UPDATE: I have made some modifications to the site, specifically adding a cache plugin. This should ultimately speed up your loading time of the blog and also reduce our overall bandwidth use. The popularity of the blog has gotten so high that it was starting to use too much bandwidth and my ISP was restricting access!

Mel Parnell passed away a few days ago at the age of 89. Parnell was a mainstay in the Red Sox rotation in the late 40s and early 50s. During his 10-year career from 1947 to 1956, all with Boston, the Red Sox compiled a .554 winning percentage. When Parnell started, that shot up to a .647 clip.  

Parnell was among the top major league pitchers during his career, placing 8th in ERA+, 10th in WAR and W-L %, and 3rd in lowest HR/9 for the 1947 to 1956 period. 

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Every fantasy league has different rules, and here’s how FanDuel.com scores it for hitters:

1B = 1pt
2B = 2pts
3B = 3pts
HR = 4pts
RBI = 1pt
R = 1pt
BB = 1pt
SB = 2pts
HBP = 1pt
Out (calculated as at bats - hits) = -.25pt

Since each contest on FanDuel is just 1 game, all we really care about is what each player on your chosen team does on game day. You’ll be required to draft 1 player at each position, so let’s break down 2011 by position to see how each player would rate on a per-game basis. Continue reading →

A couple of years ago, I wrote a column for my website asking if Chipper Jones was a future Hall of Famer. With news this morning that the Atlanta Braves third baseman will be retiring at the end of the 2012 season, I’m reminded of the flood of responses that came in after my post. Among the things I learned: Jones has been phenomenal for posting a .300 batting average, .400 on-base percentage, and .500 slugging percentage.

Besides a career slash line that currently sits at .304/.402/.533, Jones also has the most seasons by a third baseman of topping .300/.400/.500. In fact, it’s not even close. Of the 29 third basemen who’ve hit those numbers in a season with a minimum 500 plate appearances, just eight of these men have done it twice. Jones has done it six times.

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