One of my favorite things about baseball is how relaxing I find the game. The gentle rhythm and deliberate pace make it perfect for unwinding after a long summer day. In fact, only two baseball things really get me riled up. One is when my favorite team plays postseason baseball, at which point the game transforms into a stomach-churning three hour descent into a nightmare realm where nothing makes sense. The other is the Baseball Hall of Fame. Read the rest of this entry

If you're a baseball fan who got an Alexa-enabled device from Amazon for your holiday celebration of choice, I have some very good news. There's now an Alexa skill that will let her search Baseball-Reference for you!

Using the skill is quite easy. Just say "Alexa, enable Baseball Reference." Once you've done that, you can ask Alexa to look for leaders in a number of statistical categories and she'll look up the answer and tell you! In addition to a simple leader, you can also ask her to return a certain rank on the leaderboard (1-10) or list of top players (such as top two, top three, top four, etc.). You can also narrow it down to a year (1871 - present) or league (All of Baseball, National League or American League). Here's the full list of leaderboards that Alexa can search for you: Read the rest of this entry

I'd estimate that around 99% of the time, when someone comes to a Sports Reference site, they go to a player or team page and then log off. More advanced users may find their way to the frivolities pages, experiment with features like the Oracle of Baseball, or just spend several hours following link chains to various players and games.

But, just like Westworld, there's another level to our websites, one that relatively few people know how to navigate. It's called the Play Index and, in all sincerity, figuring out how to use it will change your life as a sports fan. If you've ever wondered how people find tidbits like "Mike Trout has the most WAR of any hitter through age-24" or "Dennis Rodman had seven 0-point, 20-rebound games in his career", the answer is usually that they've used the Play Index.

While the Play Index is easy to use if you know your way around, it can seem daunting to a newcomer. We often get messages from people who are eager to learn how to use the Play Index, but don't quite know where to start. So, with that in mind, we're starting a new video series called Play Index 101! Read the rest of this entry

With tonight's World Series Game 7, we thought we'd post quick links to Play Index searches showing every championship round Game 7 in MLB, NBA and NHL history. The lists are searches for home teams in Game 7s, sorted by date. If you click the date, you can see the box score for the game (when available). Enjoy!

World Series Game 7s (please note that this list is Winner Take All games, rather than Game 7s due to some World Series being longer than 7 games or having 7th games that weren't decisive in the early years)

NBA Finals Game 7s

Stanley Cup Final Game 7s

Our historical performance data for professional leagues (affiliated minor leagues, independent minor leagues, fall/winter leagues, and other international leagues) is provided by and licensed from 24-7 Baseball and Chadwick Baseball Bureau. It incorporates the work of many stalwart baseball researchers, including Cliff Blau, Art Cantu, Frank Hamilton, Reed Howard, Kevin Johnson, Bob McConnell, Jack Morris, and Ray Nemec, as well as members of the Minor Leagues Committee of the Society for American Baseball Research. Perhaps most importantly, it builds upon the seminal work of Ed Washuta, who magnanimously provided the framework to make the whole thing possible.

As licensors of this data, Sports Reference LLC is not in a position to update and make corrections to the dataset ourselves. All proposed corrections are passed along to the Chadwick Baseball Bureau. Their focus is on making corrections for post-1960 data first and then pre-1960 data as time permits. This is largely due to the sheer scope of the project, but also for economic reasons. The economic value to us for information such as the 1929 California State League is minimal and likewise the market for licensing such data is effectively zero. We wish to have the most accurate datasets we can, but must operate within the economic constraints of what the market will bear.

We realize that this may mean that certain issues and errors may linger on the site for months or even years and apologize for all such errors.

You can use the Chadwick Bureau website to send corrections or changes to the data.

Two teams, united by 176 seasons of heartbreak and disappointment, sit four games away from a title. Read the rest of this entry

As Deadspin reminded us this week, there's only one October. In that spirit, let's jump right into a breakdown of the most exciting month of the year: the MLB Postseason. Read the rest of this entry

We have made an addition to the Baseball Reference Draft Section. There is a new column of data in the table labeled "Signed." A "Y" indicates that the player was signed after that draft, while an "N" indicates that he did not.

This week is one of those good news/bad news situations. On the one had, we're just a few days away from the start of the MLB Postseason! But, on the other hand, the regular season finishes up this Sunday. With another year in the books, we wanted to break down the main contenders for MLB's most important awards. Unfortunately, Tim Tebow will have to wait till next year to get his shot at a trophy, but there are a lot of worthy players who've had excellent years. Let's take a look: Read the rest of this entry

In 1950, the Brooklyn Dodgers finished 2 games out of first place in the National League, behind a .400-OBP, 7-WAR season from Jackie Robinson, three players cracking 30 Home Runs (Roy Campanella, Gil Hodges, and Duke Snider), and plenty of pitching from workhorses Don Newcombe and Preacher Roe. Looking on from the broadcast booth was a 22-year-old who had been hired by Red Barber to supplement the team's radio and television broadcast team. Read the rest of this entry