User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
Page rendered in 0.4763 seconds
48 querie(s) executed
You are here > Home > Baseball Newsstand > Discussion
Baseball Primer Newsblog
— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Sunday, July 19, 2009
N.Y. Daily News: Professor builds baseball’s most influential Web site
Yep, cooler than Professor Hinkley on Jack Gilligan’s Island…it’s Sean Forman!
Sean Forman has always put his faith in numbers, believed in them the same way Crash Davis believed that the sweet spot, good Scotch and hanging curveballs could soothe the soul in the movie “Bull Durham.”
But that didn’t stop Forman from going against the odds and securing his dream job as a caretaker of baseball history.
...Forman is the founder and sole engineer of baseball-reference.com, the catchall Web site that puts the national pastime into real time, and supplies game telecasts, radio broadcasts, highlight shows, bloggers, reporters, even drunks trying to settle trivia disputes, with detailed accounts of Saturday’s games and those of decades gone by.
...How good is business? Forman is poised to start making hires, and in the near future he hopes to add college football and college basketball, auto racing, golf, and “anything out there with a compelling data set.” He’s turned down offers to be bought out by large media companies, which he called “the usual suspects that you would expect to be interested in a sports statistics Web site.”
Accepting an offer, he says, would have allowed him to retire.
“The question for any small company is: Are you going to sell and go with a big group, or are you going to try and stay independent?” says Forman. “Right now we’ve decided to try and stay independent.”
...“When I take a look at the script for a piece, if I have any questions I say, ‘Well, wait a minute, was that ‘65 or ‘66?’” says Bob Costas, vouching for the site’s legitimacy. “Boom, baseball-reference.com, it’s automatic. You have complete faith in it.”
Repoz
Posted: July 19, 2009 at 10:58 AM | 93 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Tags: announcements, baseball geeks, business, community, game recaps, media, online, primate meetups, sabermetrics, site news
Tags: announcements, baseball geeks, business, community, game recaps, media, online, primate meetups, sabermetrics, site news
Login to submit news.
You must be logged in to view your Bookmarks.
Hot Topics
Newsblog: Red Sox will host first scheduled doubleheader since 1978 this Sat.; here’s why
(24 - 6:48pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Report: Nationals' Stephen Strasburg has 'severe nerve damage'
(16 - 6:26pm, Jun 05)
Last: McCoy
Newsblog: Hitters Are Losing More Long Plate Appearances
(1 - 6:20pm, Jun 05)
Last: Jose Canusee
Newsblog: Roger Craig, Teacher of an Era-Defining Pitch, Is Dead at 93
(3 - 5:44pm, Jun 05)
Last: Itchy Row
Newsblog: 2023 NBA Playoffs Thread
(2571 - 5:44pm, Jun 05)
Last: smileyy
Newsblog: Howard Johnson, Al Leiter headline Mets hall of fame class
(10 - 5:42pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Nestor Cortes Likely To Be Placed On IL With Shoulder Issue
(4 - 5:37pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Arraez and Let Us Swing
(7 - 5:25pm, Jun 05)
Last: Hombre Brotani
Newsblog: OMNICHATTER for June 2023
(136 - 4:27pm, Jun 05)
Last: Walt Davis
Newsblog: Red Sox place Chris Sale on IL with left shoulder inflammation
(5 - 2:00pm, Jun 05)
Last: jacksone (AKA It's OK...)
Newsblog: Marcell Ozuna removed for not hustling in Braves' 8-5 victory
(2 - 1:39pm, Jun 05)
Last: SoSH U at work
Newsblog: Beloved ex-Met Bartolo Colon finally retires from baseball at 50
(18 - 12:07pm, Jun 05)
Last: JJ1986
Hall of Merit: Reranking First Basemen: Discussion Thread
(36 - 11:28am, Jun 05)
Last: Alex02
Newsblog: Aaron Boone’s Rate of Ejections Is Embarrassing ... And Historically Significant
(19 - 10:59am, Jun 05)
Last: Rob_Wood
Newsblog: OT Soccer Thread - The Run In
(441 - 10:16am, Jun 05)
Last: jmurph
(24 - 6:48pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Report: Nationals' Stephen Strasburg has 'severe nerve damage'
(16 - 6:26pm, Jun 05)
Last: McCoy
Newsblog: Hitters Are Losing More Long Plate Appearances
(1 - 6:20pm, Jun 05)
Last: Jose Canusee
Newsblog: Roger Craig, Teacher of an Era-Defining Pitch, Is Dead at 93
(3 - 5:44pm, Jun 05)
Last: Itchy Row
Newsblog: 2023 NBA Playoffs Thread
(2571 - 5:44pm, Jun 05)
Last: smileyy
Newsblog: Howard Johnson, Al Leiter headline Mets hall of fame class
(10 - 5:42pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Nestor Cortes Likely To Be Placed On IL With Shoulder Issue
(4 - 5:37pm, Jun 05)
Last: Howie Menckel
Newsblog: Arraez and Let Us Swing
(7 - 5:25pm, Jun 05)
Last: Hombre Brotani
Newsblog: OMNICHATTER for June 2023
(136 - 4:27pm, Jun 05)
Last: Walt Davis
Newsblog: Red Sox place Chris Sale on IL with left shoulder inflammation
(5 - 2:00pm, Jun 05)
Last: jacksone (AKA It's OK...)
Newsblog: Marcell Ozuna removed for not hustling in Braves' 8-5 victory
(2 - 1:39pm, Jun 05)
Last: SoSH U at work
Newsblog: Beloved ex-Met Bartolo Colon finally retires from baseball at 50
(18 - 12:07pm, Jun 05)
Last: JJ1986
Hall of Merit: Reranking First Basemen: Discussion Thread
(36 - 11:28am, Jun 05)
Last: Alex02
Newsblog: Aaron Boone’s Rate of Ejections Is Embarrassing ... And Historically Significant
(19 - 10:59am, Jun 05)
Last: Rob_Wood
Newsblog: OT Soccer Thread - The Run In
(441 - 10:16am, Jun 05)
Last: jmurph
About Baseball Think Factory | Write for Us | Copyright © 1996-2021 Baseball Think Factory
User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
User Comments, Suggestions, or Complaints | Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Advertising
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. Phil Coorey. Posted: July 19, 2009 at 11:30 AM (#3258890)Or worse, Joe Morgan's opinion on how they could have improved their swing...
Don't be silly. Joe Morgan hasn't seen the players play enough to have an opinion on them.
I'll be good -- I'm sending baseballreference.com money right now.
From personal experience, I vote "May."
---a database for all the game writeups that accompanied the box scores in the daily papers and / or The Sporting News. The boxscores are only the beginning of the game story.
---a database of the sort of sidebars that TSN and the daily papers used to feature on a regular basis, stories that can give a modern reader a much greater sense of what the "baseball experience" was like than can possibly be imagined from statistics and boxscores. Those of us who have read a fair number of biographies and histories can pick up this sort of information on a hit-and-miss basis, but it would be great to have a website that could put it all together, and such a website would be a perfect complement to BB-reference. Examples: When were overflow crowds finally not allowed onto the playing field? (Answer: 1949) Who were some of the legendary fans who became almost as much a part of a team's identity as some of the players themselves, only to be forgotten with the passage of time? ("Stay cool with O'Toole," "The Howling Marine," etc.) And so on. This is even more of a bottomless pit than unearthing the last 19th century box score, but in many ways the research would be a lot more fun.
Of course like everyone else here, I can only take off my shoes when entering Sean's house, and bow down in reverential awe of what he's accomplished with BB-ref. His is a life very well led. Much as I appreciated the Macmillan and Total Baseball in their time, I was getting pretty sick of having to replace them every few years, especially when they didn't have a tenth of the info that BB-ref has.
Ouch! I haven't bought one of those for nearly 40 years, but I still see stacks of them at my local Safeway, of all places. You kind of wonder what keeps them going.
I couldn't tell you the last time I visited the world wide leaders website ...
mad props guys!
and thanks!
who's who...i used to cut the pix out from those and make my own baseball cards. now, of course, you can do that with a photoshop equivalent...
Sucker. That offer was just to see if you'd bite. Now watch as Big Statistics rolls into town with a glitzy new store, undercuts all your prices, and runs you out of business! Forman enter, no man leave! Muahahaha...what? I've told you about interrupting my maniacal laughter. It really ruins the whole jois de vive...I'm just--fine. What? Huh? Oh...oh no
I seem to have miscalculated.
Why don't we see what Jon thinks?
May or may not? Sh*t, I think I wasted mid-2003 through late 2005 on there. Then one day my boss came by and said "didn't we fire you, like, three years ago?"
There is no sport in America that is as popular yet has the least easily accessable information for the fan, or curious. If Sean Forman is reading, please start with College Football. In 2 weeks you could have the most informative college football data/information website, the competition is that barren. Check out the Heisman.com site, even that sucks balls. Also, only college football can compete with Baseball in the history department, it is a natural next step. The sheer size of the information that is out there in the wilds on College Football is massive, yet nobody has really centralized it all. Yet. There is literally zero data on individual players, it is near impossible to find a ranking of top 20 leading rushers in 1980, for example.
I'm betting you could do just as well as BR.com does in selling player pages. More players and just as many--if not more--intense fans.
(EDIT) Obviously lacking in the history department. That's a freaking monumental task, though, and I imagine the 80/20 rule would be more like 98/2 in its case. That's a lot of wasted effort.
(Or did you mean on the field?)
Some individual team (fan) website's have great historical information, but there is a lot of opportunity here. College football is actually way, way undercommercialized in America. I attribute this, mostly, to the fact that the east coast, specifically NYC, is the only part of the US that doesn't care about college football.
Hear, hear! My man Beano! I need to set you up as my New York salesman.
It is a monumental task, not because the sheer size of the data, which is comparable to MLB, but because there has been no central data consolidator on the subject to date. Yet, each University does have this information, aside from the half dozen or so disputed games.
I have some ideas as to how to expand your reach out here, of course I know little about your business and how successful or unsuccessful you have been in this area, to date.
That said, it seems like 2-3 people working on it full time plus maybe some data entry folks could have it done in a few months.
I am totally serious, and will contact you with some questions and ideas before the day is out. Our ONLY problem to date has been publicity and exposure, and as you can see by our website, the Ivy Leagues are more than well represented, going all the way back to the first Yale-Harvard game of 1875.
And please be assured that my personal politics has no place in my business--My business partner is as conservative as you are and we rag on each other about it all the time and just laugh about it.
Quibble: Sure they have. They aren't printed now, maybe, and all the years aren't together, but I guarantee TSN had conference rushing and TD leaders for the year. It's a matter of collecting them, of course. Otherwise the Oompa Loompas would have to recreate these numbers by adding up gamelogs or something.
It is a monumental task, not because the sheer size of the data, which is comparable to MLB, but because there has been no central data consolidator on the subject to date.
Well, I'd describe it somewhat differently to the same end, that it's a monumental task because you're talking about 3 times the entities, with rosters 3-4 times the size, no standardized scheduling to speak of, teams changing "leagues" left and right, etc. That's partly why there was no central data consolidator. It was a damn sight harder than MLB.
Yet, each University does have this information
I would wager body parts that each conference has the basic data that you're looking for, and of course basically nobody is going to have a systematic history of advanced stats.
Again, though, I'm going to point to my 98/2 note. You think there's some crickets chirping pages on bbref, *nobody* is looking up Akron State's 1948 team. I think it would be a very hard business case to make to go to the breadth you want.
Incidentally, I note again that framing must be made by magical fairies on their limited lunch breaks at Candyland. I know it isn't you guys, because I've priced framing an oddly shaped thing or two I have that I would love to display, and I'm always aghast. Full-size fine art poster, $75, which is patently reasonable. Framed, add another $225. I still wince every time.
I agree with your analysis that 80/20 is more like 98/2. Because of this fact, had I been tasked to design this college football site, I would initially go more in depth with the most popular schools/programs and go lean on the least popular.....over time you can correct this. However I would make it mandatory to have all time leaders in every major category for every school.
What actually might be easier to centralize would be box scores, ala, retrosheet.
I'd say there are about 6 weeks to get positioned for what I am assuming is your best selling season.
He didn't clarify what "retire" means. Was it enough to live a modest life? Or was it enough to buy a villa in the South of France and spend half your days there?
He just meant new whitewalls.
Incidentally, I note again that framing must be made by magical fairies on their limited lunch breaks at Candyland. I know it isn't you guys, because I've priced framing an oddly shaped thing or two I have that I would love to display, and I'm always aghast. Full-size fine art poster, $75, which is patently reasonable. Framed, add another $225. I still wince every time.
So do I, but as you've guessed, we don't do the framing. My work consists of acquiring the original programs, doing the photoshop cleanup, doing the research and writing the text for the game descriptions. At this point the licensing, printing, framing and shipping are all done in a Pittsburgh suburb. We have sold a lot of Texas posters, though, especially this one, as you'd probably suspect. Tough to beat the comination of patriotism, a stadium dedication and a win over A&M;.
Our biggest problem to date has been trying to bootstrap the publicity into local papers, fan sites and alumni sites, which always produce sales when you can do this. I know damn well, based on my in-store sales in my former book shop (when I printed them at home, added a cheap plastic frame, and life was simple), that there's a potential fortune in these things, and it's really "just" (ouch!) a matter of getting them out there where people can see them.
I'd say there are about 6 weeks to get positioned for what I am assuming is your best selling season.
Wholesale, it's a bit less than that. Retail, it's the entire football season beginning in about a month, with the biggest sales between mid-November and just before Christmas, when half of the sales are for presents. I'll be giving you more details on this when I write you later today.
There are still some things that site provides that BB-ref doesn't (unless I'm missing something). Sometimes I like to look at a split for all the players on a team. E.g., how did everyone hit/pitch in June. At BB-ref, you either get the entire team in June, or have to look it up player-by-player. But at ESPN you can see all the team's player's on one page.
One weird thing that I think ESPN has and B-R, Fangraphs, etc. do not AFAIK is secondary average. (Not that it's difficult to figure out yourself, but it's handy.) I think there might be a few other wacky stats like that, that ESPN has but others don't. (I don't mean stats like "productive outs", I mean real stats ;)
So yeah, that's basically it... and Neyer, but I RSS him ;) [Huh, that's a weird verb.]
That said - does anyone need secondary average? Really?
Rob and the DA sitting in a tree
for R S S I N G
There's Soccerbase, but it's only good for British football, and is pretty sparse in the data for earlier seasons.
Ouch!
Notre Dame is the only big time Division I school that to date has turned us down***, which is hugely irritating, since we have over 75 ND images to date, including every big game from the 1924 "Four Horseman" game up through the Montana Cotton Bowl comeback, and beyond that I have just about every other Notre Dame program from 1930 to 1991 ready to go, both home and away. At this point all we have for them are the 1925 Rose Bowl and that Montana Cotton Bowl, since those two didn't need their approval. But I'll definitely save that offer of yours.
*** a few West Coast schools are in a pending status, but that's because our reps didn't begin the process until recently.
it's also a good source for trivia questions that baseball-reference doesn't answer (say most grand slames in an inning or heck most grandslams in a season/career) although I imagine some of those could be answered by PI.
Speaking as a college faculty member, you're nuts.
Did you get your stapler back?
Wait, did someone actually say that?
yes, post 24 and he is right in that it seems like he's talking about it as a whole, not select universities.
24. BeanoCook Posted: July 19, 2009 at 12:03 PM (#3258966)
College Football has as much, if not more, fan intensity than MLB. I will grant you that baseball has by far (by light years) the most interested in historical facts/stats/information, however college football is #2, even if a very distant #2.
Some individual team (fan) website's have great historical information, but there is a lot of opportunity here. College football is actually way, way undercommercialized in America. I attribute this, mostly, to the fact that the east coast, specifically NYC, is the only part of the US that doesn't care about college football.
I'm pretty sure there are a few other little stats that ESPN has and others don't. But, guess what, the ESPN stat page is flaking out on me ;)
I would respectfully disagree and say that college football is overcommercialized to an almost obscene degree.
that is fine, it wasn't my opinion that I put out there, but am agreeing with it because I don't really think there is the capability to overcommercialize anything, as long as there is the demand. I felt that his opinion was that they don't do a good enough job of maxxing out their potential audience. And that they don't do enough to sell the product, that their websites are under designed (again not all the programs, but there is inconsistency on quality/navigatability from different programs)
and every thing you would like to be?
That you can fly higher than an eagle
'cuz he is the wind beneath your wings?
such as: runs scored
1. 1931 Yankees
2. 19xx honkballers
3. 19xx whatevers
etc
or even for each team, such as which Padres team hit the most doubles in a season?
It's amazing, considering how much #### is on B-R, and how much new #### has just been added, how much #### is still missing. Not a knock on B-R, just a comment on how much information is out there that fans want. There's no shortage of work for Sean to do, certainly.
Your post requires too much effort. I was exhausted after the third link.
I was lazy. Sorry. That was an excellent post. Kudos.
Just a heads up to let you know that I just sent you an e-mail.
A few other very good CFB websites:
College Football Resource
College Football Reference
And the true bottomless pit for team info:
ShrpSports.com
now it would be a LOT more interesting if they had to play dressed only in boxer briefs
back to the subject
how kewl is it for sean that he gets PAID to do what he really wanted to do. wonder if he gonna raise his grrrls to be stat geeks too
how come don't none of all yall guys here raise YOUR grrrls to be stat geeks too?????
Of course she was born a Kraut and raised as a Limey and a Frog, so I guess she has some sort of an excuse for her ignorance. She even likes soccer, bless her heart.
how come don't none of all yall guys here raise YOUR grrrls to be stat geeks too?????
I have to say - this is one thing that I miss about Boston (even though I bashed it in an earlier BTF thread). Even the chicks know their baseball.
I was chatting with this Bostonian girl who was quite attractive and intelligent. The conversation flowed into baseball, and I was thinking "Aww, how cute, now she's going to tell me about how much she loves Ortiz and Manny. And I can nod my head and say, 'Yeah, they're great.'"
Instead, she floors me with "Did you know that Manny Ramirez is the only right handed batter in history to have 6 consecutive seasons over 1000 OPS?" [Which I can now handily confirm by checking BBref on another window, see how everything comes back to BBref?]
I did a head tilt and couldn't think of anything to say for 5 seconds, then stammered, "Wait, you know about OPS?"
I came this close to proposing to her that night.
Andy: any luck finding that Gotham Bowl program? kidding. I do need to visit your site again and pick myself a poster or two. Love what you got.
We'll address that issue when some woman wants to bear the fruit of my loins.
As near as I can tell, this is true, though Rogers Hornsby did have an OPS over 1.000 in eight out of nine years, including five in a row. In 1919, the season before he began his incredible streak, he led the league with a .990 mark; so it was just that close. Ramirez currently has as many 1.000 OPS seasons as Hornsby and is on pace for another in 2009.
HINT: Change your lexicon.
I probably would have gone off on a Tango-esque "OPS must die" rant. An attractive chick who's into baseball and sabermetrics is cool, but there's only so much time I could spend around a Red Sox fan.
Mine will be - bet on it!
The only sport they don't cry when it is on TV is baseball - if baseball is not on - then they want Dora or Yo Gabba Gabba - simple game really.
I could not be prouder!!
It's a work in progress.
"Hello, kettle? This is pot. You're black."
(EDIT) That's just for using lexicon, by the way.
Well, I figured most people would be using a browser that previews the link location when you mouse over (FF in the bottom left on the status bar), and most would get all but one or two of the names without clicking. My trust in you is shorn in two, Alex.
(EDIT) Of course now that I think about it, I totally should have linked to ESPN player pages instead.
ShrpSports.com
It's a great sign that they have a link for "Heismann" winners.
Pirate fans are allowed their skepticism.
Hell, that's an easy typo. How did you miss the one below it?
NFL First Draft Choices
That wasn't a pickup line that I ever used.
Also, regarding BB-ref developments, I don't know if it's possible or not, but the search engine could use some updating before other, more ambitious plans. Try typing in "Mark Grudzelanek" and you won't get anywhere. Of course, that's only a minor annoyance, but I don't see why there couldn't be a function like with Google where it would say "do you mean Mark Grudzielanek?"
The problem with Cal is that our licensing reps took forever to get around to applying to the big four West Coast schools (Cal, Stanford, UCLA, USC), and just when they finally got to it, Cal switched from being independent to being represented by a licensing conglomerate (Collegiate Licensing Company). So they had to start all over again. Send me an e-mail and I'll forward your request to our licensing rep. I just talked to them for about the 50th time about Cal and Stanford on Friday, and other than Notre Dame, the big four California schools are my biggest irritant, since we have so many great Big Game images all ready to go. But I'm sure that we'll have Cal and Stanford before too long. If only colleges granted licenses in one big swoop like MLB or the NFL, although if they did that the cost would be prohibitive.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main