Dubuque: The year in ejections
From Patrick Dubuque at Baseball Prospectus on December 15, 2017:
One of the beautiful things about baseball, particularly at a point in the year when we have so little, is how many layers it provides. Sure, you can care about winning games, and how your team of choice wants to construct and optimize its roster to go about collecting its precious victories. You may even subscribe to a baseball analysis website to better learn how these victories are accrued. But interspersed into the direct competition of the sport are other factors. There are the aesthetic considerations, the elements of baseball’s style: Puig’s bat flips, Syndergaard’s tresses, Aoki’s routes. There are the extracurricular concerns, the business and the branding and the creation of stardom. Amidst it all, directly in our view on every pitch, there is one more element: the law.
And if there’s one commonality to all of these features of baseball, it’s that you can bet on them. One of my favorite recent discoveries is the UEFL, or Umpire Ejection Fantasy League, where participants predict and dissect every ejection over the course of a year. The comment sections are filled with professional and semi-professional umpires who don’t just complain about right or wrong calls the way most fans would (though it does happen); they also dissect each situation from an umpiring perspective, how the situation was handled or mishandled. It’s like listening in on old substitute teachers talking shop, except on a subject you passionately care about.
Read the full article here: https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/36693/cold-takes-year-ejections/
Originally published: December 18, 2017. Last Updated: December 18, 2017.