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Statistical Tomes for the Offseason Blues

© Greg Spira

The calendar on the wall may say it's the beginning of the new year, but we're in the dead zone part of the baseball calendar. The season is long over. The awards have been handed out. Most of the major free agents have signed new contracts and most of the trades that were meant to be have been made. And spring training is still two months away.

In short, it's the worst time of year to be a baseball fan. Oh, sure, we can watch for the announcement of the baseball writers' 1998 Hall of Fame picks (for my view of who on the ballot should get in, check out my article at The Baseball Prospectus) in early January, and speculate on the inevitable trade of Chuck Knoblauch. Or, worse, for those really desperate, there's the financial news masquerading as baseball news in the sports section.

To avoid such a fate, baseball fans must find a way to look at the finer details of recent seasons and begin to look forward to the the future. One way of doing that is with the annual statistical books that come out around this time. So here's a review of what is and will soon be available.

STATS Inc. of Chicago issues some of the best books of this kind, and their books come out very early - November 1st each year. These books include the STATS Major League Handbook, the STATS Minor League Handbook, and STATS Player Profiles. The Major League Handbook features the career offensive and pitching records of all the players who were in the majors in 1997, 1997 fielding statistics, leader boards, park factor information, lefty/righty splits and player projections for 1998. The Minor League Handbook contains the career statistics of all players and pitchers who played in AA and AAA ball but not in the major leagues in 1997, complete 1997 A and Rookie ball stats, ballpark data for minor league parks, lefty/righty splits for AAA players, and translations of 1997 AA and AAA player offensive stats to major league equivalencies. Player Profiles features 1997 and 5 year "splits" for most prominent major leaguers, showing how each player does in home/road situations, vs. lefties and righties, in the various months of the season, with runners on base, at various points in the count, etc.

The Sporting News has been producing such annual tomes for eons, and while these books were in a slump of their own not so many years ago, they

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