August 3, 2005

What's New at Baseball Prospectus

New Web Features of BP Online

by Ben Murphy

The technical staff at Baseball Prospectus has been hard at work over the last few months introducing new web features and improving existing ones. Below you'll find information pertaining to each one. We're always interested in reader feedback, so if you have suggestions for improvements, or if you'd like to see a new feature not listed here, don't hesitate to contact us.

Statistics

Sortable Statistical Reports

The newest release in the technical updates to the site, the sortable stat reports are the result of long hours of work by the Baseball Prospectus tech team. Of course, the same old reports we've always had are still available, but the new reports offer improved presentation for everyone. Additionally, Premium and Fantasy users have the ability to sort the reports by up to three statistics, filter reports by primary categories like league, team, and position (where appropriate), and even provide a minimum playing time filter (usually PA for hitters and IP for pitchers). These reports are refreshed daily and include several links to helpful resources on the site. Player names link to the player search tool, team names link to the team audit tool, and the column headers all link to the glossary search tool, allowing you to seamlessly browse the players and team statistics, and understand what they all mean.

We're also working on updates and improvements as the new statistical reports continue to evolve. If you have suggestions for the next iteration, please feel free to contact me.

Fantasy Tools

Player Forecast Manager

The Baseball Prospectus Player Forecast Manager is the premier draft tool that will fulfill the needs of every fantasy leaguer. Developed by Nate Silver, the PFM goes through advanced mathematical formulas to calculate replacement level at each position for any fantasy league, and then evaluates each player's projections in terms of the money available on draft day, giving a full listing of players, dollar values, and the PECOTA projections for your specific league. The PFM started out as an Excel application, but we've applied all the same complicated formulas to translate the PFM to a web version, so that all of the Baseball Prospectus readers (even those without Excel) can utilize this powerful tool.

Team Tracker

Team Tracker allows Baseball Prospectus users to define up to 25 fantasy teams and track their progress throughout the year. Team Tracker rosters are linked to statistical updates that chart player performance for the past day, week, month, and season to date, and the preseason PECOTA forecasts. In addition to tracking teams' progress, the Team Tracker now features a Trade Analysis feature, where Team Tracker is integrated into the web version of the Player Forecast Manager, and each of your players is evaluated with your league specific settings and given a dollar value. You can then specify trades between your team and the rest of your league, helping you decide if you should let that big slugger go for the parts you need to make a run at the league title.

Contests

HACKING MASS

HACKING MASS is a contest to try and predict the biggest offensive stiffs in the upcoming season. HACKING MASS is an acronym for Huckabay's Annual Call to Keep Immobility Next to Godliness: Maximus Aggregatus Stiffisimus Sensire. Contestants pick a player from each spot in the infield, three outfielders, and two pitchers, hoping to pick the players that will accrue the most stiffness points, which are designed to measure both poor performance and high playing time. The winner for this contest is awarded $500 and a mint-condition, signed, framed photo reproduction of Commissioner of Major League Baseball Bud Selig. For more information, see the rules for HACKING MASS.

Predictatron

The Predictatron contest is another new feature at Baseball Prospectus this year. Contestants submit ballots that include guesses for each team's win total for the season, and then predict how the playoffs will unfold. Similar to HACKING MASS, the winner of Predictatron is awarded $500 and a mint-condition, signed, framed photo reproduction of Commissioner of Major League Baseball Bud Selig. For more information, see the rules for Predictatron, and stay tuned to the site for an upcoming article summarizing this year's picks.

Article Resources

Library

The Baseball Prospectus Library is a brand new section of the site featuring the most important, influential, and lasting articles to ever grace the digital pages of Baseball Prospectus. Any articles with lasting importance or significance have been culled from the archives and catalogued here in one of many categories and subcategories in which we've conducted research. So, any time you're looking to find the definitive study done on a particular phenomenon or the research debunking a commonly held belief, start your search at the Baseball Prospectus Library. You can browse the library here.

Other Useful Tools

Mozilla Firefox Search Plugins

The Mozilla Firefox plugins help Baseball Prospectus readers that use Mozilla Firefox get to player cards quickly. The newest search plugin has an automated installation, and within two or three clicks, the Mozilla Firefox browser will have the Baseball Prospectus search in the built in search engines (at the top right section of the browser). We also have several scripts that you can use in conjunction with the ConQuery plugin, which allow users to highlight text and directly search the Baseball Prospectus player cards and article database with the right-click menu. Click here for more information.

Team Audit

The Team Audit feature, introduced in the site redesign this past year, is the central location to learn everything you need to know about your favorite team. The Team Audit page for each team links to recent Transaction Analysis articles, recent Prospectus Triple Plays and Prospectus Notebook articles, and can display the team's core hitting and pitching statistics in sortable tables. Since these articles and stats come from elsewhere on the site, we work to pull them all together in one place for each team, and then link from the Team Audit pages to the features across the site.