Nationwide Series

Six and a half games. That is the lead the Chicago Cubs are left with after suffering their fifth straight loss on Saturday. After going 4-0 last month with a 1.41 ERA and being named the National League pitcher of the month for June, Lester has given up 13 runs the last 4 1/3 innings throughout his last two starts. “We all go through times where, just like hitters, you go through slumps,” Lester told reporters after the game. “The last two starts were obviously null and void for me. The offense…

Mantle. Mantle is possibly one of the most influential players in the Major League Baseball’s history. Because of his switch-hitting abilities and his outfielding skills, he was a most famed and renowned player in the world. He was on twelve World Series teams, seven of which he clinched the title along with his team. His athletic abilities were profound, and have long been unsurpassed and he had a passion for baseball that many lack. Mantle was born in Spavinaw, Oklahoma on October 20th, 1931.…

I live in a world of crazy numbers and fancy acronyms, the world of sabermetrics. Originally defined by Bill James in 1980, sabermetrics is "the search for objective knowledge about baseball", yet the term has grown into much, much more. Sabermetrics give ordinary people like me, the tools to predict the future, to forecast the worth of a human being with a couple of intricate formulas and a pinch of extrapolation. It appeared to be magic when I first learned about the masses of statistics…

In the beginning of the 1960s, it seemed to be the dawn of a golden age, but by the end of the 60’s many Americans thought the nation was falling apart. The JFK assassination, Vietnam war, fights for civil rights, racial tensions, radical students, and the MLK assassination were main events that took place in the 60’s that made many Americans fear the worst for our nation. In the middle of all the hate, crime, and death were 16 major league baseball teams fighting for a championship, not caring…

On September 30, 1927, Babe Ruth hits his 60th home run of the 1927 season and with it sets a record that would stand for 34 years. (Cremer pg 89) Babe Ruth was born February 7, 1844. Author's last name is Creamer. I think he is important because he currently holds the home run record in baseball history. Ruth was raised in a poor waterfront neighborhood in Baltimore “biography.com” At the age of 7, the trouble-making Ruth became too much of a handful for his busy parents. “Biography.com” At the…

Who is Babe Ruth? Babe Ruth is known as the greatest baseball player of all time. In his successful career as a baseball player Babe Ruth is recognized for his record breaking accomplishments. Babe Ruth was born on February 6th, 1895 in Baltimore, Maryland. He was the son of George Herman Ruth and Kate Schamberger one of eight children. When did his baseball career take place? Babe Ruth was 19 years old when he was launched into his very successful baseball career. He first played in the big…

Baseball is a strong game and involves a few easy things to play. The most important thing to use when playing the game of baseball is a bat. There are so many bats out there; small barrels, big barrels, even a few of everything on the bat is a barrel, but a few of my favorite bats and the more probably used bats throughout baseball is the Demarini vs. Marucci. These two bats are very well used and that's because they are the best bats put together. Let's start with Demarini. Demarini has been…

No major league ballplayer is associated with the term “pine tar” more than Kansas City Royals Hall of Famer George Brett. The pine tar incident is still one of the most bizarre umpiring decisions in recent history. What Happened in the Pine Tar Game With two outs in the top of the 9th inning and The Royals down a run to the Yankees, George Brett stepped up to the plate with a man on first base. Yankees skipper Billy Martin called on his closer, Goose Gossage, to make the final out in the game.…

Throughout The Natural, Bernard Malamud shows that Roy Hobbs is the utmost ambitious individual by portraying him as a poor man with one goal; make it to Major League Baseball. A question quickly becomes prominent throughout the first few chapters, we see Roy Hobbs struggle in the journey to the Majors, but he finally makes it and we ask ourselves, “Is Roy Hobbs a hero?” In this abstract, I will present to you multiple moments and scenes throughout Roy Hobbs’ journey into, and through, the major…

wOBA is considered one of the best stats to quantify batting performance. But what is most likely to contribute to wOBA? Is it more important to have a strong BB/K rate or to produce on balls thrown in the strike zone that are put into play? Is production when hitting fly balls more important than hitting ground balls and if so by how much? In order to determine this, I used 2013-2015 data from ESPN Stats and Information and Pitch FX to see what correlates best with overall wOBA. The first test…