Sports – FiveThirtyEight — Baseball History RSS



Why Some MLB Pitchers Are Abandoning The Fastball

It was less a baseball game, by the sixth and seventh and eighth innings, than a conference-room presentation, with the pitches as bullet points and the batters walking to the plate and jogging back to the dugout, screen-left, like slideshow graphics. “Taking It For A Spin: The Outsized Efficacy of the Breaking Ball in the […]

Continue reading




The MLB Records* That Could Fall In A 60-Game Season

The 60-game 2020 MLB season — provided it can be completed — will be filled with all of the usual statistics baseball fans love. But if history is any guide, expect the sport to again be embroiled in a fierce debate over asterisks, a controversial record-book remedy since Roger Maris broke Babe Ruth’s home run […]

Continue reading




The Astros Are Making A Historic Turnaround

The Houston Astros came out of nowhere. Just two seasons after occupying the basement of the American League West, the Astros have returned to take the top spot. Their turnaround is so sizable and so swift that it’s historic. In 2014, the Astros finished fourth in the division, with a correspondingly putrid winning percentage of […]

Continue reading