The Bill James Gold Mine 2009 (Bill James)

This book perpetuates the myth that fielding statistics are perfectly objective, which they are not. Proceed with caution, as this book only gives a vague idea of how good certain players are.

The Bill James Gold Mine 2009 is a massive compendium of statistical information about 2009's baseball teams, enhanced with comments, clarifications, and musings by expert baseball analyst Bill James. The data collected includes pitch type analysis, baserunning analysis, pitcher's record of opposing batters, performance by starting pitcher, productivity by batting order position, and fielding bible plus/minus data. James' additional essays and inquiries include "A What-If Fantasy", "Whoppers", "Triple Crowns", "96 Families of Hitters" and much more. A "must-have" for any truly dedicated baseball fan, and the perfect resource for fantasy baseball leagues!

I enjoy reading the array of Bill James books that come out. "Gold Mine" is one of those annual works that brings a smile to my face. I do wish that there were more statistics per team, but the quirky little essays that are scattered throughout the book provide value added material for the reader.

The first quirky essay is "The 96 families of hitters," in which James creates families of hitters, based on similar statistics (the ratio of doubles to triples to homers). He analyzes all major league hitters with an OPS (a function of on base percentage and slugging percentage) of .800 or more. Let's take a look at Family 415A: Members include Hank Aaron, Barry Bonds, Willie Mays, Frank Robinson, Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, and Alex Rodriguez. Or Family 415C: Ernie Banks, Yogi Berra, Dale Murphy, Luke Easter,, Joe Adcock, and Bobby Bonds. And on it goes. It's most enjoyable to run through the families.

There are brief (too brief, in my view) snippets of statistics for each major league team. Let's take the Chicago Cubs. Some basic statistics. The highest OPS for 2008 was captured by center fielder Jim Edmonds (I never would have guessed that!) with .937. One more statistic to give a sense of what's included in this book: Alfonso Soriano's pitch analysis--pitches seen, pitches taken, and pitches swung at. If swung at, was the swing a miss (27% of the time), 36% were fouled off, and 36% were put into play. What about the Southsiders, the White Sox? Highest OPS was Carlos Quentin at .965. And there is a fascinating breakdown of balls hit on the fly or on the ground or line drives to left, center, and right fields. Cool factoid: of 46 fly balls to left field, half went over the fence for a home run.

Other interesting sidebars--what pitchers threw the most gems over the past few years (defined as a sterling start); what the value of a stolen base is to each major league team; top Triple Crown seasons of all time.

In short, another solid hit from the Bill James Empire. Baseball enthusiasts who love statistics and are confirmed supporters of sabermetrics will have fun with this volume.

I've always found Bill's musings more provocative in terms of how I think about baseball than the innovative approach to crunching numbers that he revolutionized. I used to be a fan of Bill's annual publications (after the Abstract) in the early 90's primarily as it was so loose it felt like you were having a fireside chat (or "hot stove" conversation). The 2nd version of the Gold Mine is like that, with more organization and fascinating little tidbits (and yes, fresh takes on stats).

Nothing can duplicate the thrill of a baseball fan stumbling on the "Bill James Baseball Abstract" back in the early 1980s. Who knew that Steve Garvey wasn't really such a good hitter? That Larry Bowa's defense wasn't all that good? That Billy Martin had probably slagged some young arms with all those complete games? Reading the "Abstract" in those days made you feel that you knew things that most other fans - and sportswriters and broadcasters - didn't. Plus James wrote in a refreshingly irreverent style. Of course, these days with a very crowded field of sabermetricians covering every aspect of the game, it's way too much to ask James to come up with the same kind of fresh insights he made his reputation on almost 30 years ago. And with the dozens - hundreds? - of web sites out there filled with snarky commentary, his style is no longer fresh. So, although this book is a decent read, it has no chance of being as enjoyable or eye-opening as the old "Abstracts."

The book consists of entries on every major league team with about 15 essays interspersed among them. The essays appear to be reprinted from his web site (to which I don't subscribe). The team entries are not systematic appraisals of the past year or forecasts of the coming year, but consist of statistics - some standard, some not - and "nuggets" that provide facts about players on the team. The nuggets were apparently gathered by James's staff and edited by him. The nuggets are quite a mixed bag. It's not even clear if many of them are meant to be taken seriously. For instance, what are we to make of the fact that the A's Brad Ziegler "induced 20 ground-ball double plays in only 59.2 innings, for a rate of 3.0 per nine innings, a full 50% more than any other pitcher who threw at least 50 innings." Wasn't it James who first taught us not to rely on inferences from small sample sizes? The essays are also of uneven quality. Some are interesting, but I'm not sure what to make of his attempt to sort all hitters into 96 "families" on the basis of the ratio of their doubles to triples to homers. It was never clear what the point was.

There are also a regrettable number of typos. I spent a while trying to figure what was going on in the tables on p. 21 that purport to show the career records of John Smoltz and Tom Glavine against teams with various winning percentages. Since the tables give Smoltz only 50 career wins and Glavine only 81 career wins, I was baffled until I realized that the tables actually referred not to their career records, but to their records over the last seven years. There are other similar gaffes. Given that the book will have minimal value to fantasy players, I don't think it needed to be rushed into print. Taking another week or two to proofread to catch typos would have had a significant payoff.

If you are looking for one baseball book to read this spring, I would recommend the "Baseball Prospectus." But if you have the time and money, and are a Bill James fan, you will get some enjoyment out of this book, even though it is a pale shadow of the old "Abstracts."