Best baseball writers?

"Over the past two years, for instance, San Diego played more games decided by one or two runs (163) than any other NL team; at the same time the Padres won the most games by one run (59) and by two or fewer (87) and had the highest winning percentage in one-run games (.584)."

I don't see how these particular numbers are distracting at all. As for the assertion that he should've just said: Trevor Hoffman keeps them in games, well, that's probably true, but I think Verducci's is written a tad better.

 

Bill James

 

I read him but I didn't like him. He didn't write enough about New York teams in a Minnesota newspaper.

 

Mark Topkin at the St. Pete Times is a pretty good read. Ditto for Dejan Kovacevic in Pittsburgh.

 

Yes, he does. Sometimes.

Joe Christensen writes about the Yankees often at the Strib.

Lavelle is more in love with the White Sox though since he is a White Sox fan. He will write about them more often.

 

Yeah he probably writes about the White Sox more often since the...Twins...play...the...White...Sox...19...times.

 

I think Verducci's a great writer, but his East Coast bias in general turns me off to a lot of his stuff. Seems like no Red Sox guy can do any wrong in his eyes.

 

BTW, you should not compare SI writers to guys who cover a beat daily for a newspaper. Two different things.

SI people have the benefit of research help, a stringer network, a desk that sometimes rewrites heavily, and a liberal policy regarding quotes.

In this age of "....also contributed to this report," I'm amazed that SI's collaborative efforts aren't labeled more accurately.

 

I like Jose de Jesus Ortiz of the Houston Chronicle. He's been a fav of mine the past few years.

 

Well, if you judge someone's style on one piece, I guess he's gossip oriented and prone to using anonymous quotes.

 

Yet he covered the..............Yankees for a long time at Newsday.

What an annoying tendency this is: Yankee fans think everyone hates their team. Red Sox fans think everyone hates their team. At least you guys agree on something.

 

It's all subjective. McCoy and Bodley still scoop everyone. Jayson Stark doesn't have to take a backseat to anyone and neither does Paul Hagen. Verducci is still young enough to participate in the game as his umpire story illustrates. There are a few more but that's a good starting five right there.