November 19, 2012

BP Announcements

Baseball Prospectus Welcomes Zachary Levine, Incorporates MLBDepthCharts.com

by Ben Lindbergh

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I enjoy announcing additions much more than I do dealing with departures, so I'm thrilled to have only two exciting additions to announce today:

• Starting November 27th, Zachary Levine will be writing regularly for Baseball Prospectus. Here's his origin story:
  

  Zachary Levine comes to BP off three years covering the Astros for the Houston Chronicle, including the last two on a full-time basis, giving him a nice view of most of the 111 wins and 213 losses. When the annual trips to the highly underrated NL Central ports of Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, and Cincinnati were snatched away in favor of the AL West's suburban hellscapes, he took shelter as BP's newest hire for major-league coverage. You can also follow him on Twitter @zacharylevine.
  
  Before joining the Chronicle, Zachary was at the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated in 2007 with a degree in mathematics. He currently maintains a fairly nomadic existence concentrated in Albany, N.Y., Houston, and maybe your couch.
  
  He is left-handed.

• Jason Martinez, whom you already know from his work with the Minor League Update, will be expanding his role with Baseball Prospectus by bringing all the functionality from his website, MLBDepthCharts.com, to BP in January 2013. I asked Jason to write a few words about the move:
  

  In case you're not familiar with MLBDepthCharts.com, let me take a minute to explain the concept. I launched the site in February 2009 with the intention of showing readers what each team’s projected roster looked like “on paper,” as well as a snapshot of each organization's farm system. It has become an important resource for baseball fans, fantasy baseball enthusiasts, journalists, scouts, and front office executives. The move to Baseball Prospectus makes MLBDC even more user-friendly, since the statistics and analysis available at BP will be only one click away, helping readers make sense of the non-stop stream of roster moves and transactions. Other MLBDC staples, including the “How Assembled” charts, Tommy John surgery tracker, Designated for Assignment tracker, and regular features such as “Knocking Down the Door” and “Under the Radar” will all continue to be accessible through the MLBDC-related pages.

  My goal is to offer accurate, educated, and up-to-the-minute roster projections. I always appreciate tips from readers about something I may have missed, as reader feedback has been an important aspect of MLBDC, especially when it comes to the roster projections. I hope this will become a valuable resource for Baseball Prospectus subscribers. 

Zachary is an engaging and insightful writer whose BBWAA membership, experience in major-league clubhouses, and skill with statistics will enrich BP's big-league coverage, and MLBDepthCharts.com has become an invaluable resource for anyone interested in keeping track of present and future roster construction across all 30 teams. I'm very pleased that BP readers will soon be getting the benefit of both.

Ben Lindbergh is an author of Baseball Prospectus. Follow @benlindbergh
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