yes type of site sports analytics sports commentary created by multiple editor sam miller launched 1996 1996 current status online baseball prospectus bp is an organization that publishes a website baseballprospectus.com devoted to the sabermetric analysis of baseball . bp has a staff of regular columnists and provides advanced statistics as well as player and team performance projections on the site . since 1996 the bp staff has also published a baseball prospectus annual as well as several other books devoted to baseball analysis and history . baseball prospectus has fathered several popular new statistical tools that have become hallmarks of baseball analysis . baseball prospectus is accredited by the baseball writers association of america . four of baseball prospectus s current regular writers are members of the baseball writers association of america and thus eligible to vote for nominees for major league baseball s post season awards and the baseball hall of fame . 1 contents 1 prospectus entertainment ventures llc 2 history of baseball prospectus 3 bp products 3.1 web site 3.2 other books 3.3 radio show 3.4 podcast 3.5 internet baseball awards 3.6 basketball 3.7 ice hockey 4 theories 4.1 clutch hitting 4.2 views on traditional statistics 4.3 closer usage 4.4 views on sacrifice bunts and stolen bases 5 statistical tools 6 notable contributors 7 criticism 7.1 criticism of methodology 7.2 criticism of journalistic standards 8 external links 9 notes prospectus entertainment ventures llc edit baseball prospectus is formally an entity of prospectus entertainment ventures llc a private corporation that runs websites and publishes books focusing on the statistical analysis of the sports of baseball basketball and hockey . as of august 2014 the president & ceo is joe hamrahi and vice president is dave pease . 2 for several years prospectus entertainment ventures pev partnered with football outsiders for the publication and promotion of football outsiders almanac isbn 1 4486 4845 9 before 2009 called pro football prospectus isbn 0 452 28847 9 . on october 10 2007 pev launched basketball prospectus 3 a new website for the analysis of men s college and pro basketball with joe sheehan taking the role of managing editor 4 and announcing the lineup of principal writer analysts for the site . initially this website did not require a subscription for access but it introduced subscriptions in 2011 for access to most of the material on the site . basketballprospectus.com s first annual book college basketball prospectus 2008 2009 isbn 0 452 28987 4 was published in october 2008 . it released pro basketball prospectus 2009 10 for purchase online in october 2009 . 5 subsequently it published both college basketball prospectus 2010 11 isbn 1 4538 7282 5 and pro basketball prospectus 2010 11 isbn 1 4538 6899 2 in both print and online pdf modes . on march 19 2008 imagine sports announced a strategic partnership with pev and baseball prospectus . imagine sports owns the baseball simulation engine diamond mind baseball . 6 on october 14 2008 pev announced the acquisition of baseball digest daily bdd 7 an online blog devoted to baseball analysis and statistics . joe hamrahi new chief financial officer of pev and founder of bdd reported that pev s decision to acquire baseball digest daily further enhances the content offerings of baseball prospectus by adding some of the game s best analysts as well as over 100 pages of baseball news and original content . in addition bdd s player tracker provides a platform for serious fans and fantasy baseball enthusiasts to easily monitor the progress of their teams allowing users to manipulate and track the progress of an unlimited set of players over a customized period of time . 8 at the same time pev revealed publicly that it owns a significant interest in 538 www.fivethirtyeight.com a political analysis website that generates over 700 000 unique visitors daily . on february 23 2009 prospectus entertainment ventures pev launched the website puck prospectus 9 with the intent of providing cutting edge analysis of hockey . will carroll assumed the role of the executive editor and andrew rothstein the founder of puck prospectus assumed the role of the managing editor . 10 puck prospectus published its first annual book puck prospectus 2010 2011 isbn 1 4538 1784 0 in both online and print formats . initially a free site puck prospectus introduced subscriptions in 2011 . on march 24 2009 baseball prospectus announced that nate silver was stepping down as its managing partner and kevin goldstein was assuming this role . at that time pev relinquished its previously announced financial interest in silver s fivethirtyeight blog . at the same time it was announced that bp has a partnership relationship with espn.com . 11 in january 2010 pev s managing partner kevin goldstein reported that one of bp s founding members joe sheehan had departed the organization . 12 he reported that john perrotto had been elevated to full time status on the bp staff and would become the new editor in chief of baseballprospectus.com taking over that responsibility from christina kahrl . and he reported that jeff euston was joining the bp staff and that euston s cot s baseball contracts website 13 would be joining the baseball prospectus family . in february 2011 perrotto was replaced as editor in chief by steven goldman . in february 2010 bp s fantasy manager marc normandin announced that bp had established a partnership with heater magazine . 14 heater magazine ceased publication after the 2010 season . in november 2011 kevin goldstein announced that he was stepping down as pev s managing partner in favor of joe hamrahi . 15 on march 3 2012 hamrahi announced that steven goldman was stepping down as editor in chief of baseballprospectus.com ; goldman had taken a position as a lead baseball writer for bleacher report . 16 ben lindbergh was named managing editor of baseball prospectus on march 5 2012 17 and editor in chief of baseball prospectus on july 13 2012 . 18 on april 30 2012 pev s managing partner joe hamrahi announced that dan brooks harry pavlidis and brooks baseball have agreed to team up and join forces with baseball prospectus . brooksbaseball.net is the premier site for pitchf x analysis and pitch classification . 19 on march 15 2013 after explaining a week earlier that its key staff of writers had been hired away by espn baseball prospectus s dave pease declared in response to a question in the comments basketball prospectus will not be publishing any new content . we are going quiet . the archives will remain available . thank you . 20 on march 8 pease had written you ve probably noticed our basketball prospectus premium coverage has been pretty quiet lately . you may have also noticed that our core pro writers kevin pelton bradford doolittle and john gasaway are now writing for espn insider on a regular basis . late last year we learned that following their completion of the pro basketball prospectus 2012 13 and college basketball prospectus 2012 13 annuals kevin bradford and john would be moving to espn on a full time basis . history of baseball prospectus edit baseball prospectus sometimes referred to as bp was founded in 1996 by gary huckabay who recruited the initial contributor group of clay davenport rany jazayerli christina kahrl and joe sheehan with the publication of the first annual set of forecasts . that first year bp charged 20 for a statistics guide produced on a photocopier . it printed around 300 copies and sold about 170 to fellow statheads even though the book was missing the st. louis cardinals . it was terrible recalls kahrl but it nevertheless didn t discourage us . within a few years brassey s inc. published the guide which grew to about 3 000 copies . by 2007 it reached the new york times bestseller list topping 70 000 copies at 21.95 a pop . 21 the kind of sabermetric approach favored by baseball prospectus has gained significant acceptance by the management of many major league baseball clubs notably the boston red sox and cleveland indians . bp has often been considered the modern successor to bill james baseball abstract series of books in the 1980s . 22 reflecting its legacy as a group of sabermetricians who met over the internet bp has no main office . working for bp is a second or part time job for many of the regular staff who conduct their work for bp in their own home offices . the website baseballprospectus.com began in 1997 primarily as a way to present original sabermetric research ; publish advanced baseball statistics such as eqa the davenport translations dt s and vorp ; and promote sales of the annual book . 23 beginning in 2003 the site placed most of its new articles its pecota forecasts and some of its statistical databases in a premium section that could be accessed only by subscription . however in may 2011 bp announced it has made its entire archive of premium and fantasy content over one year old completely and permanently free to the public . 24 until 2007 when the site began to post general advertising the premium subscriptions and book sales were baseball prospectus main source of revenues . baseball prospectus does not publish a financial report or information about its subscriber base but it appears to have used its income to expand its breadth of coverage 25 and it has not increased its subscription prices since initiating its premium service . it also offers a subscription to those interested in fantasy baseball at a lower price than the premium subscriptions and giving access to fewer features and articles . baseballprospectus.com has a corps of staff writers who publish articles on a regular typically weekly basis under a featured heading . in addition occasional articles are published by other bp staff or freelance authors . some former regular writers no longer appear on the site but are employed on the staffs of major league baseball organizations including as of 2014 keith woolner cleveland indians 26 james click tampa bay rays 27 dan fox pittsburgh pirates 28 mike fast houston astros 29 kevin goldstein houston astros 30 and colin wyers houston astros . in addition keith law now an espn columnist in 2002 moved from baseball prospectus to work on player evaluation in the front office of the toronto blue jays . in 2009 nate silver turned his full attention to his fivethirtyeight political analysis website ; he resigned his executive post at bp and handed over management of pecota to other bp staff . given the competing career opportunities for some of bp s best known and most statistics savvy analysts maintaining a fresh supply of sabermetrically sophisticated writers remains a challenge . 31 during the 2009 baseball season bp ran a multi week open talent search competition in the spirit of the popular television program american idol in which aspiring writers submitted articles for evaluation by bp s staff members with one contestant a week from among the final ten selected by the staff then voted off by the subscribers . at least three new regular bp writers winner ken funck tim kniker and matt swartz were discovered through this prospectus idol contest . 32 in addition bp had added eric seidman to its staff early in 2009 and then acquired russell carleton pizza cutter and colin wyers in december 2009 to bolster its coverage of technical sabermetric issues . as late as the fall of 2008 seidman swartz carleton wyers daniel novick and bp idol finalist brian cartwright made up the entire staff of statistically speaking aka statspeak at mvn.com . 33 carleton left the bp staff in may 2010 but returned in july 2012 . seidman and swartz left in february 2011 . wyers was hired away by the houston astros in october 2013 . in the press