Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Link Suggestions Follow Up

Thanks for the link suggestions, everybody.  As you might notice, I have removed the 3 SBNation sites from my list of Favorite Websites.  The content on at least two of those sites had been deteriorating for some time and the new format killed it off completely.

The content on MCC has gotten sillier and sillier over the years.  I used to learn a lot from reading the comments, but now you have to wade through literally a thousand one liner insider double and triple entendre jokes to get one worthwhile comment.  FlaGiant and Shankbone occasionally put up some good draft and minor league stuff, but then you have to grit your teeth at Roger's curmudgeon act(apparently it's a different Roger than posts comments here occasionally).  Traffic on this site dropped by about half when MCC stopped posting links, but that's not the reason I am dropping them.  Minor League Ball and Beyond the Boxscore never linked this site and I've kept them on all this time due to their content.

IMO, Sickels has been mailing it in at Minor League Ball for awhile now.  I understand that he has some challenges in his life, but he's doing this for a living.  Much of his approach has become very dated.  Again, the new format makes it virtually unreadable.

Beyond the Boxscore still occasionally has a good sabermetric article but for the most part, but again, the format detracts considerably.

I guess this is my little protest against the slicked up commercialization of some formerly great websites that have bound themselves to the SBNation format.

I've added several of your suggestions to my links over on the left hand side of the blog.  This will make it easier to visit them on a daily basis.  I will continue to monitor them to make sure they live up to my initial positive impressions.

Again, I want to thank everyone who visits this blog and especially those of you who add your comments.

Any suggestions for off-season stuff?  Of course, I will be doing my Giants Top 50 Prospects thing and covering offseason trades and FA signings when they occur.  I'll start to pull together some draft stuff.  I'm thinking of expanding my Fantasy Focus, but will have to see if the ideas gel.  I might try to do some mini-profiles of prospects from other organizations as part of the Fantasy Focus.  You know, impact rookies, keeper leagues, etc.

7 comments:

  1. FYI, you were quoted in an article about a month ago that I missed, and probably you did too since you didn't commment: http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/tim-lincecums-velocity-a-lost-cause/

    Just wanted to let you know in case you didn't know.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, I did miss that. Uh oh! I hope they weren't quoting something stupid I said. I do sometimes kind of shoot from the hip and think out loud.

      Delete
    2. Ah! It was a quote of a comment I made on Fangraphs about why Timmy's ERA is a more accurate measure of his performance than FIP. Yeah, I'll stand by that one.

      Thanks for the tip.

      Delete
    3. Sorry, should have mentioned that it was a good quote, not a stupid one. :^)

      No problem, happy to do it!

      Delete
  2. Hey I missed the suggestion thread. You keep a very tight group of links, which I like. I do check out this site: http://baseballprospectnation.com/ - he covers a good cross section of prospects, and throws down consistent work. A little less consistent but interesting: http://baseballdraftreport.com/

    Also, from a Giants blog perspective, I like http://raisingmattcain.blogspot.com/
    I call it the lil blog that could, its 4-6 buddies who trade off posting. I enjoy the enthusiasm and commentary there.

    On MCC, I do participate, but there is no getting around the fact its hard to wade through a bunch of comments to get serious content. I enjoy discussions with Roger, to each ones own. As a matter of fact I'm about to throw some sunny optimism at him in Fla-Giant's fanpost on the AWL. The new SBNation format is not good, I am definitely not a fan.

    Suggestions? Its done elsewhere (BA, Sickels), but maybe comping the Gints system versus others? That is a slippery slope, and might not be a worthwhile exercise, but a different viewpoint than what is out there on what constitutes a farm system might be nice. I find there is so much focus on the blue chippys in system review, and there are only so many of those to go around.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for the suggestions. I will definitely check them out.

      Comparing the Giants system to others is hard unless you have a thorough understanding of all the other systems which I don't. Also, something like that may require more objectivity than I am able to give as an unabashed Giants fan.

      Delete
  3. Forgot to mention another site I like: Baseball Analytics

    http://www.baseballanalytics.org/

    ReplyDelete