The Clique series

Baseball is a strong game and involves a few easy things to play. The most important thing to use when playing the game of baseball is a bat. There are so many bats out there; small barrels, big barrels, even a few of everything on the bat is a barrel, but a few of my favorite bats and the more probably used bats throughout baseball is the Demarini vs. Marucci. These two bats are very well used and that's because they are the best bats put together. Let's start with Demarini. Demarini has been…

No major league ballplayer is associated with the term “pine tar” more than Kansas City Royals Hall of Famer George Brett. The pine tar incident is still one of the most bizarre umpiring decisions in recent history. What Happened in the Pine Tar Game With two outs in the top of the 9th inning and The Royals down a run to the Yankees, George Brett stepped up to the plate with a man on first base. Yankees skipper Billy Martin called on his closer, Goose Gossage, to make the final out in the game.…

Throughout The Natural, Bernard Malamud shows that Roy Hobbs is the utmost ambitious individual by portraying him as a poor man with one goal; make it to Major League Baseball. A question quickly becomes prominent throughout the first few chapters, we see Roy Hobbs struggle in the journey to the Majors, but he finally makes it and we ask ourselves, “Is Roy Hobbs a hero?” In this abstract, I will present to you multiple moments and scenes throughout Roy Hobbs’ journey into, and through, the major…

wOBA is considered one of the best stats to quantify batting performance. But what is most likely to contribute to wOBA? Is it more important to have a strong BB/K rate or to produce on balls thrown in the strike zone that are put into play? Is production when hitting fly balls more important than hitting ground balls and if so by how much? In order to determine this, I used 2013-2015 data from ESPN Stats and Information and Pitch FX to see what correlates best with overall wOBA. The first test…

Raelyn Hoffmann Davis Purple 1 20 April, 2016 Mark McGwire Breaks the Home Run Record September 8th, 1998; many of you may remember this date by a birthday or an anniversary, but this day was more than that. This date was a great day in history where a hero was born and a legend was created. September 8th, 1998 represents the day that Mark McGwire broke the record for the most home runs in a single season. “The 1998 Major League Baseball home run chase in Major League Baseball was the race…

Award, Walker left the Mets on a high note in 1975. Walker claimed a pitching coach position for the Atlanta Braves bringing them to win the Western Division title in 1982. However, the Braves lost to St. Louis in the National League Championship Series. Consequently, ending Walker’s nearly 40 years in uniform he was discarded. However, Walker didn’t end his career there. He completed his career by scouting for the Braves and the Cardinals. Devastating news struck Walker after completing his…

The novels are so good that readers cannot wait for the next book in the series to come out so they can read them with their parents or kids (whichever the case may be). The novels serve as great material for reading and even bonding with. Some readers did not like the novel for the way that Abbott takes from other kids books…

When Justin Turner smacked the game-winning home run for the Dodgers on Sunday night, announcers, sportswriters, bloggers and fans all called it the same thing: a “walk-off.” Unknown as recently as the 1970s and 1980s, the term “walk-off” for a game-ending hit has become as comfortable a part of the baseball lexicon as “balls” and “strikes.” And it’s spreading. The term’s first published citation was in July 1988, according to William Safire, who was The New York Times’s longtime language…

Baseball is in my blood. Like the light hair and eyes I inherited from my father, and the hot Italian temper I got from my mother, through my veins a love of baseball runs. Until recently, where my passion for the sport came from I was not sure. Sometime, I thought it began long ago, on summer trips to Fenway Park, when my family would drive in our oversized Chevy to Boston, park in a garage near Government Center, and take the T out to the ballpark. As I grew older and more accustomed to our…

After watching Moneyball and reading the articles, I think that statistical analysis hinders the fun of sports. I feel that sports are not always about the statistics; I feel it is about the players. Because you could be the worst batter but then be the best fielder on your team. I feel numbers are just numbers they change all the time so I personally don’t think you can see how good an athlete is by statistics. Just like one of the guys said at the end of the movie that hit home and took the…