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28 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointed, February 24, 2011
This review is from: Baseball Prospectus 2011 (Paperback)
I couldn't wait for 2011 Baseball Prospectus to arrive, but this year's book fails to live up to the quality I have come to expect from Baseball Prospectus. * PECOTA projections, updated on the Baseball Prospectus site, differ so materially from the book on many important players so as to make the numbers in the book an unreliable indicator. Really, BP knows the deadline for the book and the data is set with the end of the prior season, so this simply reflects a failure to get the job done on schedule. Revisions should reflect tweaks to the system or subsequent events, such as player movement, not major adjustments affecting large numbers of player forecasts. * The narrative is simply poorly edited. The number of run-on sentences or sentences missing clauses or incorrectly formated tables creates the impression the book was rushed to press without even a proof-reading. * In the past, I loved BP's insightful player write-ups. This year, the writing just isn't as good. It's almost as if the style of past years is being imitated but without the rich knowledge of unrelated fields that added color amd brought unique insights to player description. * Ballparks (major and minor) are listed in an appendix, but park factors have been eliminated. Unfortunately, this makes the table fairly useless. Having said that, the book made some advances: simplified the range of statistics, removing what was becoming a proliferation of redundant measures. The BP work on meusuring fielding performance is truly cutting edge. And the Top 100 Prospects section is perhaps better than ever. The single biggest thing BP could do better is simply get better organized to put out a complete, higher quality product on time.
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21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Sadly disappointed, March 11, 2011
This review is from: Baseball Prospectus 2011 (Paperback)
As I've been reading my Baseball Prospectus 2011 I've noticed some shocking errors, especially when you consider how smug and condescending some of the BP types can be. The first is right in the preface when the editor, Steven Goldman, writes in the very first line, "The art deco lobby of the Empire State Building in New York City contains a display of the seven so-called wonders of the ancient world - the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon..." What? I had to read that three times to make sure I was seeing that right. What a mistake to start off with and from the editor. Then I started spotting errors with the stats. For example, in the Diamondbacks section it says Mike Hampton threw 41 innings for them last year and allowed only three hits, one walk, and no earned runs. WHAT? Then in the Braves section on pitchers I began to notice that the games and games started numbers are messed up. Tommy Hanson pitched in 34 games, but started 40? Tim Hudson pitched in 34 games and started 36? What is going on? Very strange for a publication that prides itself on accuracy. Am I missing something? Do you want an example of the smug condescension that runs throughout these pages? How about this on page 37, "Unless a stint as a talking head on ESPN's Baseball Tonight taught Showalter the secret of baseball alchemy, enabling him to turn Baltimore's diluted and watery roster into wine - which would seem unlikely, considering the intellectual and analytical powers of his cohosts- we should proabably...." That is about as smug as it gets and it turns me off from wanting to read more. On another page a political shot at Pres. George W. Bush seems out of place, too. I don't want my baseball and politics mixed together. I won't be buying anything from BP again.
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23 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Last Time I Will Purchase This, February 28, 2011
This review is from: Baseball Prospectus 2011 (Paperback)
I agree with a number of the other reviewers that this is just not the Prospectus that I used to know and love. I have basically been alternating the past few years between BP, Shandler and not purchasing any full stat books at all, so decided to try BP again after being somewhat disappointed the last time I bought it (2008 or 2009). I was very disappointed, for the following reasons: 1) In many instances, the comments in the text of a player evaluation are directly contrary to the PECOTA projection for the player. For example, the text says that the player is declining and in danger of losing usefullness, while the PECOTA shows a significant bounceback from a down year. 2) In most instances, the PECOTA does not even attempt to project an accurate playing time for a player, often showing clear utility players with 400-500 plate appearances. Sure, I can extrapolate or divide, but why should I have to? 3) The PECOTAs are ridiculously conservative, even for someone with a full understanding of regression to the mean. And, in the case of pitchers, there are many cases where the projected ERA for a pitcher (not one who is 38 years old, either) is higher than any of his past three years. And--see # 1 above--in at least one instance, that's despite a textual evaluation that the player is basically an elite level performer who should be expected to stay that way (Ubaldo Jimenez). 4) The occasional witticisms seem forced, inapposite and, rather than adding to the enjoyment of the reading, clearly detract from what ought to be the mission of the book. 5) The team essays are of variable quality; many were just not that interesting in terms of the facet of the team performance that the writers chose to focus upon. 6) Although the stat capsules are cleaner, there is a definite absence of advanced-level metrics. If BP is actually looking at things like line-drive rate, etc., they are not providing that information for us to see as Shandler did last year. If the stat projections appeared to be better, I would probably be willing to just trust in the evaluative tools, but they haven't earned that benefit of the doubt this time. 7) I can't tell if the fielding measures are better or not. Unless I've mistaken, what they say they are doing is throwing out all zone ratings becuase there are potential flaws in the reporting and semi-subjective aspects of that methodology and just reducing it all to a measurement of the subject player against some average figure of plays that should be made. It's hard for me to see this as a step forward; it looks like they have just thrown in the towel here (which may not be a bad idea come to think about it). There are probably more negatives, but that's all I can think of off of the top of my head. Frankly, the only thing I liked about the book was the solid writing/evaluation in the Top 101 prospects section. But I can find material of a similar quality on that subject in a lot of places. The bottom line is I feel like I wasted my money and will probably now go get the Shandler book instead.
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