Baseball and other things
Getting excited for the upcoming baseball season. Reading and watching things to that effect. 100-word reviews below. Currently rewatching Baseball by Ken Burns and reading The Glory of Their Times by Lawrence S. Ritter. Looking to attend Opening Weekend for the Mariners in Seattle and Opening Day for the Indians in Spokane (Colorado Rockies system).
Waiting to hear back on a few submissions. Couple micro-CNF pieces and a short story or two. Knocking-out my book section-by-section and very excited about it.
On a running pause while I work on my book. Takes too much energy to juggle both. Been leaning-in on yoga though and the family and I joined a climbing gym and that’s been great. Loving it.
Anyway.
Why We Love Baseball — Joe Posnanski
Great book. Storytelling favored over analytics. Love stats, but love a good story more. Posnanski invites other subject matter experts to weigh-in to great effect. Expands on often-heard stories with fun caveats and personal anecdotes in an easy-to-read style. Lighthearted and funny and informative and accessible. Enjoyed hearing bits about the Kansas City Royals (Posnanski wrote for the Kansas City Star once upon a time). Loved the author’s perspective on infamous stories that may or may not be true. “You will believe what you choose to believe because that’s the beauty of art and movies and baseball.”
A Fan’s Guide to Baseball Analytics — Anthony Castrovince
Interesting read. Learned a lot. Castrovince has a funny and accessible writing style, which is especially important when discussing math and statistics. Avoids getting too in-the-weeds with the math, but is more than willing to go in-depth on viability or otherwise of common baseball stats like RBI (don’t call them RBI’s or ribbies in front of Castrovince) and OBS. If you’re looking for quick explanations of different stats then this book works, but Google works quicker. If you want to learn the stats and read about some of the prevailing opinions concerning different stats though this book is second-to-none.
