Big Bad Baseball Annual 2000 (Paperback)

~ Don Malcolm (Author), Sean Forman (Author), Brock J. Hanke (Author), Jim Furtado (Author), Tom Ruane (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The 2000 Big Bad Baseball Annual provides the most comprehensive analysis of baseball on the market today. BBBA 2000 features a unique mix of player analysis, team essays, and ground-breaking work on baseball's past, present, and future. Whether you are a rotisserie player, a simulation junkie or a devoted baseball fan, you will find all 512 pages both informative and entertaining.

BBBA 2000 contains park-adjusted stats, exclusive Scouting Value rankings and author analysis and comments for over 850 major league players. We utilize player analysis tools like Extrapolated Runs, the most accurate runs estimation tool on the market today, the Starting Pitcher Quality Matrix, a start by start look at starting pitchers, and Win Probability Added, a detailed look at relief pitcher usage and effectiveness.

BBBA 2000 takes a comprehensive look at each team's season with insightful team essays covering up and coming stars, fading veterans, astute personnel moves and some not so astute. The Big Bad Baseball Annual also takes a swing at where the team has been and where it might be heading.

Not satisfied with just team and player comments? The Big Bad Baseball Annual also takes on some of the larger issues in baseball and baseball analysis. BBBA 2000 contains essays by Don Malcolm on the interaction between player age and team winning percentage and a start by start look at starting pitcher performance in the 1962 and 1963 seasons when the strike zone was dramatically altered.

We team with David Smith of Retrosheet for never before seen breakouts of the 1975 World Series combatants -- the Cincinnati Reds and the Boston Red Sox. Brock Hanke reminds us why Rogers Hornsby was on the All-Century team, and Ron Johnson looks at fifteen years of situational data to tell us whether to switch-hit or not to switch-hit.

BBBA 2000 also covers the minor leagues with Sean Forman's Prospectwatch. Sean studies the top prospects for each major league team using his exclusive grading system and player comparison tools. Sean also provides an overview of each team's minor league system.

All this and much more appears in the 2000 Big Bad Baseball Annual.

The authors of the Big Bad Baseball Annual thank you for your generous support. Not only for buying our book, but also for providing feedback and comments that aid our effort to produce a book worthy of our National Pastime.

From the Publisher

The Big Bad Baseball Annual grew out of the Baseball Abstracts, first produced by Bill James, and later by Brock Hanke after James "broke the wand". Just as James pushed the field of baseball analysis and sabermetrics forward with his ground-breaking work, the Big Bad Baseball Annual attempts to do the same with new tools and new studies on just what makes some teams winners and some players Hall of Famers.

The BBBA authors are some of the most widely read and recognized baseball analysts on the internet today. Whether you are reading the player comments, the team essays or the general studies, you will find their writing engaging, informative and entertaining.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 512 pages
• Publisher: Mad Aztec Press (February 15, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962584622
• ISBN-13: 978-0962584626
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,063,227 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Too little too late, April 20, 2000

By A Customer

I was told this was the best baseball book of the year. I didn't get it until after the season started, and when I did, I got a juvenile treatise with about four bright spots, and a really bad case of envy for everyone else that does analysis. I would be embarrassed to be associated with this incarnation of a tantrum. My five year old can behave with a little decorum, which is more than I can say for whoever edited this. Only a couple of writers are worth even glancing at, Firtado and Walker, and they're clearly too smart to stick with this sinking ship for long. Their work gives this book a second star, but just barely.

It's also hard to read, amateurishly put together, and basically a complete waste of money and time. There's no reason to buy this book. The childishness evidence in this book is so bad as to be disrespectful to the game. Don't these authors even LIKE baseball?

Hideous.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars big and bad are correct, April 22, 2000

By A Customer

As a baseball fan who reads any book of analysis I can find, I eagerly awaited this year's BBBA. I was extremely disappointed that the editors found it necessary to go into childish tirades against their competition

I usually don't wallow thru all the stats that the BBBA folks put out as I enjoy the commentary more. However, since the commentary was more in the line of sophmoric back slapping and finger pointing, I thought I'd study the stats more carefully.

The BBBA folks will tell that they are right. I did find much of their analysis to countradict their competitors. While I don't know who is right or wrong, a least let me decide as to which information I find more useful, don't tell me.

I especially found the attacks on Bill James to be curious. Bill James started the revolution on baseball anyalsis, in essence giving these insolent writers their start. If you don't agree with him, just write it, don't rip him.

I won't spend another penny on the folks from BBBA.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Dense, informative -- but flawed -- annual, March 31, 2000

By A Customer

Like its predecessors, the Big Bad Baseball Annual 2000 is written for a relatively small subgroup of baseball fans: the hard-core sabermetricians who can practically come to blows over the proper weighting of walks vs. stolen bases in evaluating a hitter's performance. For these readers, the BBBA contains more information than any other annual, including several wonderful historical and methodological essays as well as commentary on current players.

Unfortunately, the book suffers from its authors' self-indulgence. There are far too many in-jokes which amuse the co-authors more than the readers; far too many obscure acronyms; and far too many times when the authors take 100 words to make a 25-word point. At times, it feels as though the authors hide behind pretentious language to make their concepts seem more important than they are.

A more serious problem is the BBBA's penchant for taking nasty pot shots at the competition -- STATS Inc., Rob Neyer of ESPN, and especially the Baseball Prospectus. The target audience for this book isn't impressed by authors who proclaim "Nyaah, nyaah, I'm smarter than you are."

In short, the BBBA is a valuable analytical tool, but would be much better if a professional editor were allowed to cut through the BS and obfuscation.