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Read a note from the editor of the Fall 2017 BRJ.Many of the best conversations I’ve had at SABR conventions — and at ballparks around the world — begin with the question “Did you know…?” Nearly every baseball fan knows some amazing story or fact about the game, the players, or the team. Some of […]

Read a note from the editor of the Spring 2017 BRJ.I would like to take this space to express how grateful I am for SABR’s existence. I grew up in a baseball-loving household, with a shrine to Thurman Munson on my wall (I was at summer camp when his plane crashed). But there were occasional […]

A note from the editor of the BRJ.I truly enjoyed SABR’s annual convention this year in Miami. I suppose that goes without saying: baseball is one of my favorite things, and baseball research is one of my favorite things about baseball. But something about the mix of topics and experiences jelled into a delicious melange […]

Read a note from the editor of the BRJ.Are we all on a quest to glean meaning from life around us? Well, maybe not all people are, but I am, and I strongly suspect that many SABR members funnel that urge into their study of baseball. It doesn’t matter what creed you ascribe to — […]

A note from the editor of the Fall 2015 BRJ.

A note from the editor of the Spring 2014 BRJ.

A note from the editor of the Fall 2014 BRJ.

A note from the editor of the Spring 2014 BRJ.

I am honored and delighted to greet you as the new editor of the Baseball Research Journal. I’ve been a SABR member for nearly 15 years, and many of my most cherished memories have been made at SABR Conventions. I never dreamed I’d one day be working for the organization that has brought me so […]

INTRODUCTION Social network analysis (SNA) is the mathematical examination of the interactions between individuals when those individuals intermittently come together for a common purpose. It is often used to determine the influential or important people in a large group of interacting individuals. The term “social network analysis” is somewhat of a misnomer as the interactions […]

INTRODUCTION This article reports on MLB “played-with” relationships for the time period 1930 through 2016. We define player A as having played-with player B if the two appeared in the same major league game for the same team. This doesn’t necessarily mean both players stood on the field at the same time. We also include cases where […]

The Curse of the Bambino hovered over the Boston Red Sox for more than 80 years, from the time they sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees after the 1919 season until early in the 21st century. The team that won four world championships in the 1910s didn’t win another until 2004. A close […]

  Duke Farrell as depicted with the Chicago White Stockings on an Old Judge baseball card, circa 1888–90. (Trading Card Database)   Welcome to nineteenth-century baseball research, where it is not uncommon for the newspapers to have conflicting box score data, and for the box score data to be in conflict with the written article […]

In the late nineteenth century, Philadelphia was a hotbed of baseball activity, and specifically of idiosyncratic match-ups. For three weeks in October 1866, Philadelphia was the scene of two “world” championship series that helped determine the future course of baseball in the areas of professionalism and race. The 1860s were a decade of rapid social […]

Charles Dickens may well have written about baseball’s American League East in 2018 that it was the best of teams, it was the worst of teams. This grouping of only one-sixth of all Major League Baseball (MLB) clubs contained both baseball’s winningest team that season (the Boston Red Sox, 108 wins) as well as its […]

This article was selected for inclusion in SABR 50 at 50: The Society for American Baseball Research’s Fifty Most Essential Contributions to the Game. INTRODUCTION In his Hall-of-Fame career, Lou Gehrig established himself as a premier RBI producer. According to the 2012 edition of The Elias Book of Baseball Records, Gehrig led the American League […]

Much as the 1989 season would prove to be a refreshing change from the dreariness of the 54-107 season that preceded it, the afternoon skies in Baltimore on April 3, 1989, surprised forecasters and fans with pleasant sunshine and warm temperatures. The 1989 Opening Day game between the Orioles and Red Sox at Memorial Stadium […]

Left-hander Jon Lester had enjoyed one of the best careers of any major-league pitcher in the twenty-first century when he signed a $5 million, one-year contract with the Washington Nationals not long before spring training 2021.1 In 15 seasons with the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs, Lester had won 193 games, played on three […]

“When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” So said the reporter at the end of the 1962 movie The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.1 Upon hearing a popular politician confess that he was not the real shooter, the journalist ignored the fact to preserve the lawmaker’s legend. Thirty years earlier, baseball writers at the […]

On October 2, 1949, it might have seemed hard to believe that the St. Louis Browns had been champions of the American League just five years before. St. Louis’s other baseball team slumped quickly back to the bottom of the AL standings after the end of World War II, when many players throughout the majors […]

The 24,220 fans attending the second game of the day-night doubleheader might have expected a pitching duel: Both starting pitchers were former Cy Young Award winners.1 However, most fans would have understood if Max Scherzer had skipped this start or gone on the injured list. He had broken his nose just the day before during […]

For more than 15 years, beginning in 1993, SABR member Gene Carney wrote a semi-regular column called “Notes From The Shadows of Cooperstown” from his home in Utica, New York. At first, Carney’s self-published “Notes” was an eclectic blend of essays, poetry, book reviews, and a little baseball history. Then, in September 2002, it took […]