One of the features here at Baseball-Reference that I think a lot of people miss is the Videos section, which can only be accessed via the "more [+]" dropdown menu. I hope this won't be the case much longer, because I'm going to be adding a number of new videos to the page over the coming weeks and months in an effort to educate users on some of the more common tools we have on the site. But even before I begin posting new videos, there are already three tutorials on the page that you should watch if you'd like to maximize your experience as a B-R user. The first one involves box scores and the many cool (and semi-hidden) tricks you can execute in them with the right know-how. The second deals with player and team gamelogs, and again clues you in to some of the neat aspects of those pages that you might not have noticed at first glance. Finally, the third video discusses the changes that B-R underwent back in the spring, when we redesigned everything to make the site easier to use, more readily able to add new goodies, and of course, to make it match our brethren at Basketball, Football, Hockey, and Olympics.

So go and watch those videos now if you want to become a Baseball-Reference master user. And be on the lookout, new videos are coming soon, possibly as early as the end of this week!

Here are the most plate appearances among active players with no career homers:

  Cnt Player              **PA**   HR From  To   Ages   G    AB    R    H   2B  3B  RBI  BB  IBB  SO  HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB   CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions Teams
+----+-----------------+---------+---+----+----+-----+----+-----+----+----+---+---+----+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+----+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+-----------+
    1 Reggie Willits        785     0 2006 2009 25-28  280   651  122  173  27   1   49  103   2  133   3  20   8   8   37  12  .266  .365  .310  .675 7/98D     LAA
    2 Brett Tomko           546     0 1997 2009 24-36  392   455   23   71   9   0   29   19   0  180   0  71   1   5    0   1  .156  .189  .176  .365 *1        CIN-SEA-SDP-STL-SFG-LAD-TOT-NYY
    3 Pedro Martinez        509     0 1992 2009 20-37  472   426   22   43   6   2   18   14   0  188   3  63   3   5    0   0  .101  .135  .124  .259 *1/5      LAD-MON-BOS-NYM-PHI
    4 Luis Ordaz            496     0 1997 2006 21-30  206   440   51   96  13   0   30   34   1   53   2  15   5  12   12   5  .218  .274  .248  .522 *6/45     STL-KCR-TBD
    5 Ben Sheets            492     0 2001 2008 22-29  221   433   12   33   3   0   12   18   0  204   0  41   0   2    0   0  .076  .113  .083  .196 *1        MIL
    6 Ryan Dempster         491     0 1998 2009 21-32  449   424   18   40   8   1   13   12   0  173   0  55   0   3    0   0  .094  .119  .118  .237 *1        FLA-TOT-CIN-CHC
    7 Brandon Webb          457     0 2003 2009 24-30  199   391   12   44   9   0   29   10   0  182   0  55   1   4    0   0  .113  .134  .136  .270 *1        ARI
    8 Jamie Moyer           440     0 1986 2009 23-46  666   354   22   47   5   0   12   31   0  126   1  52   2   5    0   0  .133  .204  .147  .351 *1        CHC-TEX-STL-BAL-TOT-SEA-PHI
    9 Doug Davis            422     0 1999 2009 23-33  282   375   12   31   4   2   12    4   0  151   1  42   0   4    0   0  .083  .095  .104  .199 *1        TEX-TOT-MIL-ARI
   10 Brett Myers           410     0 2002 2009 21-28  234   346   17   42   9   0   10   19   0  114   0  45   0   8    0   0  .121  .167  .147  .314 *1        PHI
   11 Matt Clement          410     0 1998 2006 23-31  239   348   22   33   5   1   12   14   0  174   4  43   1   2    0   0  .095  .139  .115  .254 *1        SDP-FLA-CHC-BOS
   12 Josh Fogg             404     0 2001 2009 24-32  244   335   21   40   4   0   11   13   0  113   1  55   0   2    1   0  .119  .155  .131  .286 *1        CHW-PIT-COL-CIN
   13 Aaron Cook            388     0 2002 2009 23-30  201   306   20   47   5   1   14   18   0  102   2  61   1   3    0   0  .154  .205  .176  .381 *1        COL
   14 Oliver Perez          385     0 2002 2009 20-27  191   332   13   53   1   0   14   13   0  112   0  38   2   2    3   1  .160  .190  .163  .353 *1        SDP-TOT-PIT-NYM
   15 Derek Lowe            384     0 1997 2009 24-36  561   316   19   42   5   0   15   20   0   94   0  46   2   6    1   0  .133  .183  .149  .332 *1        TOT-BOS-LAD-ATL
   16 John Thomson          381     0 1997 2007 23-33  216   318   20   63   6   1   22   12   0  133   0  48   3   3    0   1  .198  .225  .223  .448 *1        COL-TOT-TEX-ATL-KCR
   17 Chris Carpenter       312     0 1997 2009 22-34  272   275   12   29   3   0    6    9   0   88   0  27   1   3    0   1  .105  .133  .116  .249 *1        TOR-STL
   18 Tim Hudson            311     0 1999 2008 23-32  309   271   16   44   8   1   21   11   0   85   0  29   0   6    0   0  .162  .195  .199  .394 *1        OAK-ATL
   19 Esteban Loaiza        311     0 1995 2008 23-36  379   271   16   46   4   1   18    3   0   59   0  36   1   8    0   1  .170  .178  .192  .370 *1        PIT-TOT-TEX-TOR-CHW-WSN-OAK
   20 Wade Miller           308     0 1999 2007 22-30  155   273   20   47   9   0   17    4   0   86   0  30   1   3    0   0  .172  .183  .205  .388 *1        HOU-BOS-CHC

Only Willits and Ordaz are non-pitchers, although it's debatable whether Ordaz can really be considered active since he hasn't appeared in the majors since 2006.

Limiting to non-pitchers, here is the list:

  Cnt Player              **PA**   HR From  To   Ages   G    AB    R    H   2B  3B  RBI  BB  IBB  SO  HBP  SH  SF GDP  SB   CS   BA   OBP   SLG   OPS  Positions Teams
+----+-----------------+---------+---+----+----+-----+----+-----+----+----+---+---+----+----+---+----+---+---+---+---+----+---+-----+-----+-----+-----+---------+-----------+
    1 Reggie Willits        785     0 2006 2009 25-28  280   651  122  173  27   1   49  103   2  133   3  20   8   8   37  12  .266  .365  .310  .675 7/98D     LAA
    2 Luis Ordaz            496     0 1997 2006 21-30  206   440   51   96  13   0   30   34   1   53   2  15   5  12   12   5  .218  .274  .248  .522 *6/45     STL-KCR-TBD
    3 Bernie Castro         209     0 2005 2006 25-26   66   190   32   48   4   4   17   18   0   28   0   1   0   2   13   4  .253  .317  .316  .633 /*4D7     BAL-WSN
    4 Alejandro De Aza      185     0 2007 2009 23-25   67   164   20   38   9   2   11   11   1   42   1   6   3   2    2   0  .232  .279  .311  .590 /*87      FLA
    5 Brian Bixler          155     0 2008 2009 25-26   63   141   20   24   7   1    4    8   2   59   4   2   0   1    1   0  .170  .235  .234  .469 /*64      PIT
    6 Joaquin Arias         141     0 2006 2009 21-24   41   129   19   38   8   3   10    8   0   15   2   2   0   4    4   2  .295  .345  .403  .748 /*465D    TEX
    7 Ivan Ochoa            134     0 2008 2008 25-25   47   120    7   24   8   0    3    4   1   28   3   7   0   3    0   1  .200  .244  .267  .511 /*64      SFG
    8 Ramon Nivar           133     0 2003 2005 23-25   42   121   13   27   1   2   12    4   0   19   2   5   1   1    5   4  .223  .258  .264  .522 /*8       TEX-BAL
    9 Trevor Crowe          121     0 2009 2009 25-25   44   106   16   22   6   1   10    9   0   25   1   3   2   4    4   0  .208  .271  .283  .554 /879      CLE
   10 Luis Cruz             106     0 2008 2009 24-25   35    94    8   20   3   0    4    6   1    3   3   2   1   3    1   1  .213  .279  .245  .524 /*64      PIT
   11 Mike Rouse            102     0 2006 2007 26-27   49    91    9   15   4   0    6    8   1   24   1   1   1   1    2   1  .165  .238  .209  .447 /456      OAK-CLE
   12 Ramiro Pena           100     0 2009 2009 23-23   53    94   14   26   5   1    7    5   0   17   0   1   0   1    3   1  .277  .313  .351  .664 /564D     NYY
   13 Michael Saunders       97     0 2009 2009 22-22   28    90   10   20   1   1    4    6   0   30   0   1   0   1    3   1  .222  .271  .256  .527 /*7       SEA
   14 Nathan Haynes          95     0 2007 2008 27-28   60    89   13   22   0   1    4    6   0   23   0   0   0   1    5   3  .247  .295  .270  .565 /987      LAA-TBR
   15 Brian Bocock           93     0 2008 2008 23-23   32    77    4   11   1   0    2   12   0   29   0   4   0   2    4   2  .143  .258  .156  .414 /*6       SFG
   16 Roger Bernadina        91     0 2008 2009 24-25   29    80   11   17   2   1    2   10   0   22   0   1   0   3    5   3  .213  .300  .263  .563 /*879     WSN
   17 Dane Sardinha          88     0 2003 2009 24-30   31    80    3   10   1   1    6    4   0   29   0   2   2   2    0   0  .125  .163  .163  .326 /*2       CIN-DET
   18 Jerry Gil              88     0 2004 2007 21-24   30    86    3   15   2   1    8    0   0   33   1   0   1   2    2   0  .174  .182  .221  .403 /*6       ARI-CIN
   19 Chris Heintz           88     0 2005 2007 30-32   34    82    1   19   3   0    9    4   0   18   0   2   0   3    0   0  .232  .267  .268  .535 /*2       MIN
   20 Don Kelly              85     0 2007 2009 27-29   44    75    8   16   3   1    3    6   0   12   3   1   0   1    0   0  .213  .298  .280  .578 /76459    PIT-DET

These totals are remarkably low.

Just since 1970, check out all the players with multiple seasons qualifying for the batting title but hitting no homers:

                   From  To   Ages Seasons Link to Individual Seasons
+-----------------+----+----+-----+-------+------------------------------+
 Ozzie Smith       1979 1992 24-37       6 Ind. Seasons
 Larry Bowa        1970 1982 24-36       6 Ind. Seasons
 Jerry Remy        1976 1983 23-30       4 Ind. Seasons
 Frank Taveras     1976 1980 26-30       3 Ind. Seasons
 Duane Kuiper      1976 1979 26-29       3 Ind. Seasons
 Roger Metzger     1971 1976 23-28       3 Ind. Seasons
 Otis Nixon        1994 1995 35-36       2 Ind. Seasons
 Lance Johnson     1991 1993 27-29       2 Ind. Seasons
 Gerald Young      1988 1989 23-24       2 Ind. Seasons
 Pete Rose         1981 1983 40-42       2 Ind. Seasons
 Tom Herr          1981 1982 25-26       2 Ind. Seasons
 Alfredo Griffin   1981 1989 23-31       2 Ind. Seasons
 Rodney Scott      1980 1981 26-27       2 Ind. Seasons
 Greg Gross        1974 1975 21-22       2 Ind. Seasons
 Don Kessinger     1973 1975 30-32       2 Ind. Seasons
 Ron Hunt          1972 1974 31-33       2 Ind. Seasons
 Enzo Hernandez    1971 1974 22-25       2 Ind. Seasons
 Mark Belanger     1971 1973 27-29       2 Ind. Seasons

Now, I don't think any of these guys finished their career with zero homers but it seems to me that we should have a number of players with several hundred PAs and no homers, not just 3 players with as many as 200 PAs. Homers are just so incredibly prevalent now compared to years bygone.

Babe Ruth, Share Demo

One of the underlying principles for the site has been to make it easy to share data. We've done that by supporting the baseball-databank.org and retrosheet and we've done that by providing options like CSV and PRE above each of the tables on the site.

These options are helpful to power users who understand excel and don't mind taking a little time to learn new things, but for users who just want a quick and dirty table, it has always been a little too
hard to copy and paste what's on the site. We've solved that problem and dramatically increased the ways and means you can share data on the site.

The sharing feature appears only on Babe Ruth's pages (main, batting, fielding, pitching) right now, but after we are confident all of the bugs are worked out it will appear on every page and above every table on the site (sadly I have to rewrite much of the play index to get this to work there) and on our other sites as well.

Here is how you do it.

• Find the data you want to share. For now just on the Babe's Page
• Click on the SHARE link just above the stats next to the header (javascript required).
• 
• A sharing toolbox appears and buttons to delete columns and rows appear allowing you to pare the data down to just want you want.
• Please note that any sorting should occur before you delete rows or columns.
• Next select the output option from html, to iframes, to pre-formatted (good for most internet forums) and more. We've created a Demo Page for all of the options
• If we don't have the format you want, let us know.

Please give this a try and use it to post something at your favorite websites or a website you write for. You will be free to use this data anywhere, we would just ask that you include the citation at the bottom of the table as a courtesy to us for providing this service.

Also, once we are confident all of the bugs are worked out, we will release this site-wide, so give us all of the feedback you can.

I'm sure most (if not all) of you have seen this page at one time or another: Leaders & Records. It's a popular page, given that it links to all of our leaderboards for batting and pitching. But our feeling is that many people scan the top of the page and find the leaderboard link they want, but remain unaware of the content "hidden" at the very bottom of the page. So today, I'm going to show you some of the other features you can access from the Leaders & Records page, features that you may not have known about because they were tucked away at the bottom of the screen.

Read the rest of this entry »

Dan Szymborski weighs in with some career projections using ZiPS. There's Jeter, career intact and on track for more than 3,500 hits, but then two "what-ifs" -- Ichiro for the beginning of his career (what if he had played in MLB from the start?), and Dickie Thon for all but the beginning (what if he hadn't been hit in the face by a Mike Torrez heater?). Most interesting to me: if ZiPS was reality, Ichiro would rank 3rd all time in hits, trailing Cobb by just one.

I was surprised to notice that both Migeul Cabrera and Ryan Braun have both hit 27 homeruns this season without a sacrifice fly between them. The sacrifice fly statistic has been used consistantly since 1954 and in that time only 5 players have finished a season with more than 27 home runs and no sacrifice flies. Here are the leaders since 1954:

Read the rest of this entry »

Since 1954 there have been only 7 seasons in which a pitcher has pitched 200 or more innings and not been victimized by  a SB. Four of those seasons were turned in by Whitey Ford. This season,  Joel Pineiro has a chance to complete the eighth such season and become only the fifth different pitcher  (since 1954) accomplish this feat. Thus far,  Piniero has pitched  170 2/3 innings without allowing a SB.  The last player to steal when Piniero was on the mound was Hanley Ramirez last August 11. Here are the leader since 1954 in IP without allowing a SB:

Read the rest of this entry »

YouTube - Steroids in Sports :: Part 1 :: Its Your Call with Lynn Doyle

I taped a tv appearance on It's Your Call with Lynn Doyle a show that appears on the Comcast Network. The appearance was back in May or April, but it appears it is going to air this weekend or maybe last weekend. Unclear. I linked part I above. Here are Part II and Part III. Other than nodding my head like a broken bobblehead, I thought it went ok. I did come off a little glib at the end and that wasn't my intention. My main point is that baseball would be better without steroids, but I don't agree with the hysteria and scarlet letters handed out around their use.

Check out the longest streaks in 2009 where a starter had at least 6 IP in each game:

                  StreakStart  Streak End Games   W   L   GS  CG SHO  GF  SV   IP     H    R   ER   BB   SO   HR   ERA  HBP  WP  BK Teams
+-----------------+-----------+-----------+-----+------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 Adam Wainwright    2009-04-16  2009-08-25    25   14   7  25   1   0   0   0  176.2  164   55   50   46  146  15   2.55   2   6   0 STL

 Ubaldo Jimenez     2009-05-01  2009-08-23    22   11   6  22   1   0   0   0  155.1  123   51   49   49  135   9   2.84   5   6   2 COL

 Danny Haren        2009-04-07  2009-07-18    19   10   5  19   3   1   0   0  138     93   32   30   18  137  12   1.96   2   4   0 ARI

 Josh Beckett       2009-05-05  2009-08-12    18   12   2  18   3   2   0   0  128.1   96   37   31   26  114   9   2.17   4   0   0 BOS

 Tim Lincecum       2009-04-18  2009-07-17    17   10   1  17   3   2   0   0  126.1   91   31   27   29  149   4   1.92   2   6   0 SFG

 Zach Duke          2009-05-12  2009-07-29    15    6   6  15   2   0   0   0  104.1  104   40   40   25   52  11   3.45   3   2   0 PIT

Both Wainwright and Jiminez have active streaks.

Going back to 2005, Roy Halladay has the longest streak:

                   StreakStart  Streak End Games   W   L   GS  CG SHO  GF  SV   IP     H    R   ER   BB   SO   HR   ERA  HBP  WP  BK Teams
+-----------------+-----------+-----------+-----+------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 Roy Halladay       2008-06-20  2009-06-07    32   22   6  32   7   3   0   0  238.1  212   75   67   38  208  16   2.53   7   5   0 TOR

 C.C. Sabathia      2008-04-22  2008-09-16    28   15   6  28   9   5   0   0  213.1  176   52   47   41  216  14   1.98   5   2   1 CLE-MIL
 Chris Carpenter    2005-04-16  2005-09-13    28   20   3  28   7   4   0   0  216    165   54   49   44  197  15   2.04   2   3   0 STL

 Roy Halladay       2007-07-17  2008-06-08    27   14   8  27  10   1   0   0  211.2  195   76   69   37  148  13   2.93   9   2   0 TOR
 Brandon Webb       2005-07-26  2006-06-10    27   14   6  27   2   2   0   0  197.1  179   59   53   32  149  14   2.42   4   5   2 ARI
 Tom Glavine        2005-07-15  2006-06-03    27   15   8  27   2   1   0   0  189.1  155   54   50   43  122  12   2.38   5   0   0 NYM

 Adam Wainwright    2009-04-16  2009-08-25    25   14   7  25   1   0   0   0  176.2  164   55   50   46  146  15   2.55   2   6   0 STL
 Roy Halladay       2006-05-03  2006-09-05    25   13   4  25   4   0   0   0  181.2  168   69   66   28  113  16   3.27   4   2   0 TOR

 Ubaldo Jimenez     2009-05-01  2009-08-23    22   11   6  22   1   0   0   0  155.1  123   51   49   49  135   9   2.84   5   6   2 COL
 Danny Haren        2008-09-16  2009-07-18    22   12   5  22   4   2   0   0  160    112   39   37   21  162  13   2.08   2   5   0 ARI
 Pedro Martinez     2005-04-04  2005-08-03    22   12   3  22   2   0   0   0  157    107   50   49   31  163  12   2.81   2   4   0 NYM

The 2009 leaders both have a shot to match that streak but probably not this season.

I noticed that Nick Swisher had a really high OBP (.367) for a guy with such a low BA (.245.)

I did a season finder for qualified players ranked by OBP and then in Excel I subtracted each player's batting average. Here are the leaders in 2009 for highest differential of OBP minus BA:

Interesting how different guys end up on this list for different reasons. Pujols is hitting .318 but he walks so damn much. Carlos Pena barely hits at all (except for dingers) but he also walks a lot.

Lots of guys from the AL East on this list...a very tough division.