Monthly Archives: July 2012

A Beautiful Friendship by David Weber: a short review

That said, it’s a decent book, and fills in some of the Sphinx backstory. Half of the book’s a direct reprint of the novella with the same name; the second half is new and, to me, far too predictable. Weber often goes out of his way to make his villains into real people; no such luck with this one, who’s pretty much a cartoon.

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The Baseball Analyst Issue 6: a review

Pete Palmer extends the Jim Reuter essay, on park factor calculations, from the previous issue of the Analyst. Palmer’s first extension demonstrates that Reuter’s method works better if the calculations are based on innings rather than games, and shows how to make the necessary adjustments. He also suggests a further, individual-player, version of the factor which he doesn’t fully describe. The second extension begins with the observation that a team’s offensive “park effect” is partly the product of not facing the local pitching staff; he adds adjustments to allow for that. James’ editorial comment takes issue with some of Palmer’s assumptions, pointing out that James and Palmer differ on the implicit meaning of context as applied to calculating park effects.

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