Why I Like Baseball

AN ONLINE JOURNAL OF BASEBALL ENTHUSIASM, by CECILIA TAN

  • SABR 40: day two wrap up (Braves game)

    Yesterday before dashing for the bus to the ballpark, I actually managed to see a little more than half of Robert Fitts’s presentation on Babe Ruth and Eiji Sawamura, the 17 year old pitcher who struck the Babe out and became a national hero. The young pitcher had forfeited his future in academia by taking…

  • Today’s Baseball in Tweets

    One of the best pro panels ever. Bobby Cox, Phil Niekro, Marke Lemke, Ron Gant, spoke at #sabr40 Recap: http://ow.ly/2m1DJ # Did Mantle's famous homer travel 565 feet? Alan Nathan says it *might* have: http://ow.ly/2m39C # More analysis: are outs on the bases worse than others? Is hitting with RISP random or a skill? Today…

  • SABR 40: day two, post four

    Okay, gearing up for the last five research presentations of the day. I might have to miss the last one in order to get the bus to the ballpark in time. I probably should have not paid for the bus and just taken MARTA instead, but when I was buying my tickets months ago it…

  • SABR 40: day two, post three

    Do Batters Make Slumps Worse by Trying to Escape Them? Jeff Switchenko, with several co-authors Hitting with RISP: Real differences between players by Eric Van Are Outs Made on the Bases More Harmful than Other Types of Outs? David W. Smith

  • SABR 40: day two, post two

    Revising Mantle’s Griffith Stadium Home Run A Case Study in Forensic Physics Alan Nathan An intriguing look at one of the most iconic moments in the career of one of baseball’s most iconic figures. Lots has been written about the famous homer, as written about in the book CLOUT by Dan Valenti. The characters: Yankee…

  • SABR 40: day two, Braves Player Panel

    SABR Liveblogging Day 2 I’m late to the Braves Player Panel. I would have been on time, but something I had at the breakfast buffet didn’t agree with me. I’m there now, though… Phil Niekro, Mark Lemke, Bobby Cox, Ron Gant, and moderated by Pete Van Wieren Recapped below!

Welcome to “Why I Like Baseball”

“Why I Like Baseball” is the one of the oldest baseball blogs on the Internet, dating back to before the word “blog” existed. (I think it’s slightly older than Jay Jaffe’s “Futility Infielder,” and was slightly preceded by Geoff Young’s “Ducksnorts.”) I first hand-coded the site in HTML 1.0 at some point in 1998-99. (Most of the pre-2000 content has been lost to bit rot.) I had been away from baseball for much of my adult life, but the McGwire-Sosa home run race caught my attention I was underemployed at the time, had just published my first book of short stories with a major publisher, and was taking freelance writing gigs as I could find them, but what I really wanted to write about was baseball. So I took it upon myself to create a website. Back then, the Internet was smaller and less populated, and I soon discovered my little passion project was being read by folks like the editors of ESPN: The Magazine, who published a surprise shout-out to me. My writings eventually led to me writing a book on the Yankees, editing the Yankees Annual, writing for Gotham Baseball, and at one point even creating online content directly for the Yankees themselves.

Author Cecilia Tan with Babe Ruth

Cecilia Tan

Writer