Baseball for beginners

JasonC · Post by **JasonC** » Wed Jul 16, 2003 4:15 pm

I just have to jump in with book recommendations.
 
 _Pure Baseball_ is outstanding. That will make you appreciate the game in a way you never thought possible.
 
 _The Thinking Fan´s Guide to Baseball_ by Leonard Koppett is also outstanding. Koppett is one of the few press box insiders who thought differently.
 
 _Ball Four_ by Jim Bouton is also a must. It gives you some real insight into the behind-the-scenes stuff. It was written in 1969, but I doubt that much has really changed in 34 years.
 
 _Moneyball_ is outstanding. It´s sort of _Ball Four_ for the front office.
 
 If you want to get to know the game with other thinking people go to <a href="http://www.baseball-primer.com" target="_blank" target="_new">http://www.baseball-primer.com</a> The baseball banter is quite good.
 
 Read Rob Neyer´s column on espn.com
 
 DO NOT LISTEN TO WHAT MOST ANNOUNCERS SAY!!!!!! Notable exceptions include:
 
 - Ray Fosse
 - Mike Krukow
 - Bert Blyleven
 
 and of course these guys still have their fair share of old-school mentalities. Joe Morgan sometimes says brilliant things but is a bit full of himself now and is not accountable for his silliness.
 
 DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES LISTEN TO ANY OF TIM MCCARVER´S "FACTS"!!! Much of what comes out of Tim´s mouth is based on his many years in baseball, but are often completely unsubstantiated by fact. A case in point is his supposition that a leadoff walk is more likely to score in an inning than a leadoff hit. Dave Smith of retrosheet (http://www.retrosheet.org) looked it up and this is not true.
 
 Good biographies include:
 
 _Hitter: the Life and Hard Times of Ted Williams_ by Ed Linn.
 
 The Babe Ruth biography by Ed Linn.
 
 _Nice Guys Finish Last_ by Leo Durocher
 
 _Ty Cobb_ by Charles Alexander (the Stump biography is a bit sycophantic)
 
 _Men at Work_ by George Will isn´t bad
 
 That should get you going <IMG SRC="images/forum/icons/icon_smile.gif">
 
 - Jason

RobVarak · Post by **RobVarak** » Wed Jul 16, 2003 4:36 pm

Jason,
 
 All quality recommendations...particularly the point about ignoring color "anlaysts". Add Steve Stone to your list of *mostly* accurate analysis. He drops the occasional clunker, but he´s usually quite good.
 
 I see from your profile that you´re an OOTP player. I´ve been struggling with this game so much lately. I enjoy the GM aspects, but the game simulator seems to have a lot of problems...especially when compared to a robust engine like Diamond Mind. Any thoughts?

JasonC · Post by **JasonC** » Wed Jul 23, 2003 1:42 pm

Rob-
 
 Thank you for the kind words. I agree that Stoney is pretty good. He just sounds so earnest all the time. But once you get used to his style it´s OK. I always loved when he´d very dramatically say, "And now the game is on the shoulders of one Randall Kirk Myers".
 
 Anyhow, I quit playing OOTP because I just couldn´t handle the PbP anymore. I was able to look past it when I wrote my review, but after a while the errors just got to me. Also, the pace and lack of robustness in the PbP dialog was just too much after a while. I went back to Diamond Mind and it was like putting oil on a wheel. I forgot how great its PbP really is. It´s not quite perfect (I let the CPU handle my baserunning decisions), but it´s awfully good.
 
 If somehow you could combine the GM engine of OOTP with the PbP interface of DMB you´d have the perfect game. I think DMB is so good because it is meant for replays, where OOTP is fundamentally a GM sim.
 
 I hope this helps. Sorry for the late reply.

RobVarak · Post by **RobVarak** » Wed Jul 23, 2003 3:45 pm

Agree with you 100% on the DMB/OOTP comp. Glad to see I´m not just being a grouch on that one <IMG SRC="images/forum/icons/icon_smile.gif">

snate · Post by **snate** » Wed Jul 23, 2003 3:56 pm

I am a huge baseball fan and I am not a fan of OOTP either. I feel like a heretic after all the praise it gets. The actual baseball part of the game is not that good IMO.