Tag: baseball

  • Red Sox Starting Rotation: A Dumpster Fire in a Dumpster Fire Year

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    Brendan Barry
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    Baseball for the Red Sox starts on Friday. Am I glad baseball is back? Yes? I love the sport and will be glad that it’s back on the air to give me something to watch. But the But the way it’s being done boggles the mind. Here today I don’t want to get into the…

  • The Mookie Betts Trade

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    Brendan Barry
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    Apologies for the lack of posting the last few months. There are several things going on in my life right now that have prevented me from focusing on Coffee Spoons as much as I would like. I will endeavour to resume posting, but it might not be the daily schedule it had been for at…

  • How Worldly Is the World Series?

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    Brendan Barry
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    The World Series began Tuesday night. But, as many people reading this blog will know, baseball is not exactly a global sport. But is it really? CityLab looked at the origin of Major League Baseball players and it turns out that almost 30% of the players today are from outside the United States. They have…

  • Angry Birds? Bad Birds

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    Brendan Barry
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    Baseball is almost upon us. And oh boy do the Baltimore Orioles look bad. How bad? Historically bad. FiveThirtyEight went so far as to chart the expected WAR, wins above replacement, of each position of all teams since 1973. And the expected Orioles lineup looks remarkably bad. What is nice about this graphic is the…

  • Is Bryce Harper Another Ryan Howard?

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    Brendan Barry
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    No. Definitely not. But, the position of this article by FiveThirtyEight is that the Phillies, the Philadelphia baseball team that just made the largest guaranteed contract in North American sports, may have purchased the rights to somebody who is a few years past his prime. The author tracked the performance of similar baseball players over…

  • Are Baseball’s Big Contracts Worth It?

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    Brendan Barry
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    On Tuesday the San Diego Padres signed Manny Machado to a guaranteed contract worth $300 million over the next ten years—though he can opt out after five years. Machado was one of two big free agents on the market, the other being Bryce Harper. One question out there is whether or not these big contracts…

  • 119 Wins

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    Brendan Barry
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    The only number you need today, the only factette you need to see today, is this. Well done, Boston. Well done.

  • Switching Sides

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    Brendan Barry
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    For those of you not baseball fans, Tuesday is Major League Baseball’s trading deadline. By that evening, trades of players between teams are sort of over for the year. (Yes, I understand this is the non-waiver deadline and the waiver deadline is at the end of August, but that is complicated to explain.) And so as…

  • Albert Pujols Isn’t Too Bad at That Baseball Thing

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    Brendan Barry
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    On Friday Albert Pujols joined the very elite club of baseball players who have managed 3000 hits in their career. Thankfully FiveThirtyEight covered it with a few graphics in an article that pointed out just how hard it is to do. Especially because, and I did not know this, Pujols did it in a not…

  • Baseball Is Back

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    Brendan Barry
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    Praise the (baseball) gods. The 2018 season starts today with I think every team playing—the Red Sox open down in St. Petersburg against the Rays. So today’s post is on the light side as I could not find the awesomest baseball graphic. But FiveThirtyEight did at least preview the season and ran some projections. Naturally, I disagree…