We have decided to turn off the Oracle of Baseball for good. There are a couple of reasons for this which I'll get into below. This feature was launched in 2002 or so, so this isn't a decision we take lightly. We know there are a number of users who will be sad to see this tool go, but in order for us to update the sites in a number of important ways we will be making this change.

• The Oracle of Baseball only gets about 10,000 user sessions per year which makes it very hard to prioritize work to improve or modify it.
• Related to the above, the Oracle data hasn't been updated since 2021. Due to some underlying data changes it became difficult for us to keep the data generated and up to date. As I said above, it's hard to prioritize a multi-day project to update the tool when it won't pay off for decades at current usage rates.
• We are working on a major upgrade to our operating system on the sites' servers. The Oracle is a custom built app that runs as a daemon in the background on the servers and porting this over to our new infrastructure would be a difficult process even for a tool that was generating a lot of revenue.

All three together mean we can't make a business case (or even a user-based case given the opportunity cost of this work) to continue supporting this feature. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Earlier in the week we added All-Rookie voting for the 2023-24 season to Basketball Reference on our Award Voting page and player pages. We also took this opportunity to flesh out most of the history of the voting for this honor thanks to the research efforts of NBA historian Todd Spehr. Read the rest of this entry

Stathead Basketball has added something new, completing our set of college basketball discovery tools!

The Player Season Finder gives you the power to search through College Basketball Reference's extensive database of player statistics for both men's and women's Division 1 hoopers. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Sue Bird, Michael Jordan, Caitlin Clark and all your other favorites are in this new tool. You can use the Player Season Finder to answer questions like:

1. What men's player had the most seasons with 1,000 points?
2. What women's team had the most All-Americans in a season?
3. What women's player played the most minutes as a freshman?
4. What season had the most men's players averaging 10+ assists per game?

The College Player Season Finder completes the initial set of college basketball tools on Stathead. If you already subscribe to Stathead Basketball, all of these are included in your plan!

If you've never tried Stathead before, now is the perfect time. The new college tools are perfect for reflecting back on the most recent season, researching WNBA rookies' college careers, prepping for the NBA Draft and looking for comps for top-ranked prospects, and following the NBA Playoffs and WNBA season. It's only $9 per month and your first month is free to try it!

Sports Reference has made three hires this Spring—two Product Managers to help define and guide new product efforts and an Executive Operations Coordinator to streamline company’s operations. We are thrilled to welcome:

Zach Bellavia, Product Manager, joined Sports Reference in April 2024. He's a Butler University alum and has an affinity for the scrappy underdog. Zach follows most Chicago sports teams. He also enjoys the niche fandom of professional track and field and distance running.

Emily Anderson, Product Manager, joined Sports Reference in 2024. Originally from Indiana, Emily now resides in Chicagoland after a long stint in Los Angeles. Emily was indoctrinated into following Michigan football and the Detroit Tigers from childhood, but her support of Arsenal, Chicago Sky, and the Chicago Red Stars is self-imposed. You can find her on Twitter at @EmCAnderson.

Kristiana Passeri, Executive Operations Coordinator, joined Sports Reference in the middle of 2024 after interning on the marketing team the previous summer. She resides in the Chicagoland area and is a fan of the Bears and Fire, as well as FC Barcelona, Argentine/US soccer and Formula One.