Thursday, March 27, 2008

Where I get my information

I should by all means be working on spectral simulations at my desk, but with the Brewers game coming on in 3o minutes, I thought I'd take this time to divulge the lot of my many resources. In a way it feels like I'm giving people a reason not to read my posts, but I also know that I'm not always on top of things, especially when work gets a bit buys. This way, people will know where they can go if they're bored and want to check out some statistics or background stories.

The first site I always go to is MLB.com. Yes, it's the obvious one, but many people don't realize how valuable it can be because of its user friendly nature. About 95% of the numbers I obtained for the pitcher durability story was found in the historical statistics feature. Additional information regarding player backgrounds can be found in the player bio section for a year by year run down.

However, I rarely use MilwaukeeBrewers.com. While Mr. McCalvey does an excellent job maintaining the site and keeping it up to date, he hardly has any solid insight, that blows my mind, then again neither does Tom Haudricourt.

JSonline is a pretty solid website that is pretty much on the ball with everything. 99% of the time, they're the first to release roster moves and contract signings. However, Tom tends to play the homer a bit and leaves the opinion articles to the more risque writers at the Sentinel. Nevertheless, Tom contributes quality quotes and other news well before MilwaukeeBrewers.com, but the two often repeat each other because they both get the same interview. MilwaukeeBrewers.com's only benefit is quality video clips of exclusive interviews with players after the game.

Additional Brewer sites that I go to every now and then are the ESPN team website for contract and salary information or foxsports.com for some additional videos from players. I don't really like listening to Ken Rosenthal, so I usually avoid Fox Sports when I can.

As for statistics, scouting reports and quality projections, I refer to Baseball-Reference and Baseball Prospectus. BP is a modern minded look at baseball that dredges through millions and millions of statistics and develops some of their own to determine the quality of players. Ultimately, they discuss the ceilings of their players based on their age history and basic skills. It's pretty interesting, but you have to be careful not to buy into everything they tell you. BR, on the other hand is basically a comprehensive statistical encyclopedia of every player and the numbers they recorded during the entire time in professional baseball, minor leagues included. It affords statistics that may be difficult to find on MLB.com or BP, in a relatively user friendly matter. I have yet to master it's entire power yet, and hope to in the near future because there are things I find important that others may not.

Other sites I check out for news and rumors include: Pro Sports Daily, MLB Trade Rumors, and Brewerfan.net. Hope this is helpful to any one looking into sports as much as I do.

1 comment:

steve said...

Aaron....Here's to a great season!!!Thanks man for keeping the baseball sparks rising this off season winter..