http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/ A discussion of sabermetrics, hosted by the authors of "The Book" en tangotiger@yahoo.com Copyright 2008 2008-07-18T18:44:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/selling_beer_to_someone_who_looks_under_30_is_22_and_the_legal_age_is_18/ Skydome.  Requiring someone to ask for ID of someone who “looks” under 30 seems to me like a pornography law: you know it when you see it.  Aramark insists that their mystery shoppers “definitely” look under 30.  But, this is an art, not a science.  To that end, does it make sense to fire someone over art?  I’d also like to know what would have happened had a policeman seen this transaction take place? Great comments in the link.  These are my two favorites: Sabermetrics, MLB_Management, Blogging 2008-07-18T18:44:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/walkabout_towns/ Pretty cool app. Blogging 2008-07-18T02:45:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/newsweek_schell_regression/ Extremely tame article.  The highlight is only that it is mentioned in Newsweek.  Sabermetrics, Media 2008-07-18T01:55:01-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/that_will_be_300000000_please_paid_in_3_installments/ The NY Giants announced their plans in selling personal seat licences.  It looks like the average licence is around 4K I suppose, and with 75K seats… well, the math is easy here.  K times K is MM.  And 75 times 4 is 300.  Wow.  Imagine buying a baseball team for 300MM.  Instead, here, you pay 300MM for the right to buy tickets!  Fantastic idea.  I’m sure the Jets will follow something similar. By the way: no complaining.  If you don’t like it, don’t buy it!  Reminds me of Kelly Ripa being outraged at the 20,000$ price tag of some Hermes purse.  - “This is an outrage, this is ridiculous, I can’t believe it!” - “Miss Ripa?  It’s our last bag.” - “I must have it!!” Sabermetrics, Finances, Other Sports, Football 2008-07-17T22:05:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/converting_pitchf_x_into_performance_stat_lines/ Great job by Paul in finding correlations between some PITCHf/x data and performance stat lines. A couple of things I’d change is make it GB/(GB+FB), rather than ratio.  I’ve talked about this alot.  Use K/BFP, not K/9IP.  I’d also suggest trying an additional correlation against (K-BB)/BFP. 2008-07-17T20:23:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/murray_chass_internet_writer_not_a_blogger/ Just read his About Me page.  Has any internet writer / blogger insulted more people before making his first post than Murray Chass? Hat tip: Will Carroll. UPDATE (Jul 17): Likely a hoax. UPDATE (Jul 18): Confirmed as real. See posts below for details. Sabermetrics, Media 2008-07-17T15:28:01-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/negro_leagues/ I’m watching Bob Costas NOW.  I think it’s all uppercase, though I don’t know why.  Is it an acronym?  Here’s his site.  Anyway, there were a couple of interesting things on that show: Sabermetrics, Minors_College, MLB_Management 2008-07-17T14:10:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/asset_allocation/ Non-sports post. Blogging 2008-07-16T18:33:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/highlights_and_lowlights_from_the_asg/ #1 highlight:  Josh Groban’s singing of GBA. #1 lowlight: Edinson Volquez’ hat. It was interesting that with almost everyone wanting the game to end (I assume), the home plate umpire, Cousins, calls the winning run out when he was clearly (at least if you watched the replay) safe by a mile even though the throw beat him.  I guess Cousins was positive that he was out, even though he was wrong. 2008-07-16T04:25:00-05:00 http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/muzzling_players/ While I offered one terrible and one legitimate choice when I asked about Depodesta last week, I will offer two terrible choice about Papelbon: is he delusional, or is he simply an idiot?  Even now, as he concedes to Mariano for the right to close the All-Star game at Yankee stadium, it was more a sign of respect to what Mariano has accomplished, rather than what Mariano is doing right now.  Papelbon has 51K and 7BB.  But Mariano is 50 and 4!  Papelbon has allowed 16 runs in 40 innings, and Mo is 5 in 42!  Are you kidding me?  Papelbon has also given up more HR (3 to 2) than Mo.  On BIP, Mo’s batting average is .232, while Papelbon is .313.  While Papelbon is ready to put Mariano out to pasture, Mariano is actually the grim reaper, ready to cut down any closer who thinks he’s already better than Mo. Papelbon is either delusional in thinking that he’s already a clearly better pitcher than Mariano (he might be a bit better at this point, if only because we automatically expect a guy that is 11 years younger than the other to be physically better), or he is an idiot for speaking as if he wants to step aside to give grandpa Mo one last hurrah. When I was a kid, I was a huge Redsox fan.  I suffered in 1986.  At some point soon after that, my two favorite athletes growing up, Tim Raines and Kelly Hrudey, were traded.  I also was in college.  It was time to move on and grow up from having a favorite team, when the players are so callously treated.  No need to excuse a big mouth just because he wears your team’s colors. If we’re going to accept to ignore everything a GM or manager says about a player as being insincere, perhaps we need to also ignore everything a player says about a peer as being completely ignorant. Sabermetrics, MLB_Management 2008-07-15T17:52:00-05:00