Greg Maddux, the future Hall of Fame pitcher, had his jersey retired by the Atlanta Braves on Friday. With the Braves, Maddux cemented his legacy as one of the best pitchers of his generation — and perhaps one of the top 15 pitchers of all-time.
Maddux pitched with the Braves from 1993 until 2003. Both before and after his stint with the Braves, Maddux pitched for the Chicago Cubs. In his final two seasons, he pitched for the San Diego Padres and the Los Angeles Dodgers.
For his career, Maddux had a record of 355-227 and an ERA of 3.16. He pitched …read more

Ivan Rodriguez, the future Hall of Fame catcher who is now with the Houston Astros, set the all-time record for most games caught in a career. Fittingly, he set the record on Wednesday against the Texas Rangers — the team he played on for the fist dozen seasons of his career.
With his outing on Wednesday, Rodriguez has now caught 2,227 games. The former record holder was Carlton Fisk. Bob Boone is third on the list with 2,225 games, while Gary Carter is fourth with 2,056 games.
The now 37-year-old native of Puerto Rico originally broke into Major League Baseball when he …read more

   Photo by <<graham>>   some rights reserved
Here’s an obscure one for you. Jim Mahoney played shortstop and some second base for four teams over parts of four seasons.
As a rookie with the Boston Red Sox, Mahoney collected his first big-league hit on July 29, 1959 — a single to left in the fourth inning against Cleveland right-hander Cal McLish. Later that season, on September 14, Mahoney knocked the first of his four career homers, a three-run shot off White Sox right-hander Turk Lown.
Mahoney didn’t appear in the big leagues in 1960, but resurfaced with Washington the following season, getting into 41 games …read more

Is it the height of conceit to display a photograph of oneself reading one’s own book in an attempt to lure people into buying said book? Quite possibly it is. Regardless, I’m pleased to announce that the Ducksnorts 2008 Baseball Annual is now available. You can buy it as a hard copy or a PDF download, depending on your taste.
The book is subtitled “More than any sane person should ever need to know about the San Diego Padres,” and I think that pretty well covers it. You’ll find 200+ pages of analysis and commentary on the 2007 Padres season, the …read more

   Photo by Xurble   some rights reserved
I haven’t made these challenging enough for the likes of you. Let’s see if we can change that:

I was born during the Eisenhower administration.
I am a former first-round draft pick.
I once won my league’s batting title.
I never drew as many as 40 walks in a single season.
Four of my former teammates are now in the Hall of Fame.

Who am I?

What am I reading this morning? Glad you asked:

Bill James Interview (Hardball Times). Chris Jaffe talks to the man who first popularized sabermetrics (and actually coined the term). James on what kinds of issues sabermetrics might tackle in the future:

League-perspective decision making. Looking at decisions based from the standpoint of the league.

Simple example: the wild card. The National League has 16 teams, and four teams make the playoffs. Sixteen is divisible by four. The natural thing to do, it would seem to me, would be to make four divisions and have four division races.

It wasn’t done that way, and if …read more