Youth Single-Sport Specialization in Professional Baseball Players.

Background: An increasing number of youth baseball athletes are specializing in playing baseball at younger ages. Purpose: The purpose of our study was to describe the age and prevalence of single-sport specialization in a cohort of current professional baseball athletes. In addition, we sought to understand the trends surrounding single-sport specialization in professional baseball players raised within and outside the United States (US). Study Design: Cross-sectional study; Level of evidence, 3. Methods: A survey was distributed to male professional baseball athletes via individual team athletic trainers. Athletes were asked if and at what age they had chosen to specialize in playing baseball at the exclusion of other sports, and data were then collected pertaining to this decision. We analyzed the rate and age of specialization, the reasons for specialization, and the athlete\u27s perception of injuries related to specialization. Results: A total of 1673 professional baseball athletes completed the survey, representing 26 of the 30 Major League Baseball (MLB) organizations. Less than half (44.5%) of professional athletes specialized in playing a single sport during their childhood/adolescence. Those who reported specializing in their youth did so at a mean age of 14.09 ± 2.79 years. MLB players who grew up outside the US specialized at a significantly earlier age than MLB players native to the US (12.30 ± 3.07 vs 14.89 ± 2.24 years, respectively; Conclusion: This study challenges the current trends toward early youth sport specialization, finding that the majority of professional baseball athletes studied did not specialize as youth and that those who did specialize did so at a mean age of 14 years. With the potential cumulative effects of pitching and overhead throwing on an athlete\u27s arm, the trend identified in this study toward earlier specialization within baseball is concerning

On the distribution of career longevity and the evolution of home run prowess in professional baseball

Statistical analysis is a major aspect of baseball, from player averages to historical benchmarks and records. Much of baseball fanfare is based around players exceeding the norm, some in a single game and others over a long career. Career statistics serve as a metric for classifying players and establishing their historical legacy. However, the concept of records and benchmarks assumes that the level of competition in baseball is stationary in time. Here we show that power-law probability density functions, a hallmark of many complex systems that are driven by competition, govern career longevity in baseball. We also find similar power laws in the density functions of all major performance metrics for pitchers and batters. The use of performance-enhancing drugs has a dark history, emerging as a problem for both amateur and professional sports. We find statistical evidence consistent with performance-enhancing drugs in the analysis of home runs hit by players in the last 25 years. This is corroborated by the findings of the Mitchell Report [1], a two-year investigation into the use of illegal steroids in major league baseball, which recently revealed that over 5 percent of major league baseball players tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in an anonymous 2003 survey.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, 2-column revtex4 format. Revision has change of title, a figure added, and minor changes in response to referee comment

Baseball!

Postcard from Lily Niland, during the Linfield College Semester Abroad Program at Kanto Gakuin University in Yokohama, Japa

University Scholar Series: Joel Franks

Batter Up!: Race, Colonization, and Baseball in the Twentieth Century On April 24, 2013 Joel Franks spoke in the University Scholar Series hosted by Provost Ellen Junn at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library. Dr. Joel Franks spoke about race, colonization, and baseball in the twentieth century. Dr. Franks teaches Asian American Studies and American Studies. He has done extensive research and writing in the area of Asian Pacific American sports. His most recent work, The Barnstorming Hawaiian Travelers: A Multiethnic Baseball Team Tours the Mainland, 1912- 1916, tells the story of a multiethnic, multiracial team of Hawaiian ballplayers who played across the continental U.S. from 1912 through 1916. This book sheds light on a little known tale of baseball, race, and colonization in the United States during the early decades of the twentieth century.https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/uss/1018/thumbnail.jp

Competitive Boosterism: How Milwaukee Lost the Braves

By any measure, major-league baseball in North America surely qualifies as big business. The national pastime is a vital component of today\u27s urban political economy, and baseball teams resemble other high-prestige businesses in that cities must compete for the privilege of hosting them - whatever their true worth. A study analyzes the transfer of the Milwaukee Braves baseball franchise to Atlanta in 1965 as the outcome of competitive boosterism or the active participation of local elites in luring trade, industry, and investment from other cities for the purpose of economic development

An Actuarial Analysis of the Production Function of Major League Baseball

The majority of major league baseball production function studies have utilized data (nonstandardized and standardized) from only one baseball season. This research study utilized data from the 1980-1984 baseball seasons. The results indicate that factors contributing to victories fluctuate. Consistent with prior research, this study found batting average, manager\u27s career win-loss record and the strike-out-to-walk ratio to be the most significant factors contributing to victories. Inconsistent with prior research, this study found that fielding average can also be significant

Getting the Swing of Surface Gravity

Sports are a popular and effective way to illustrate physics principles. Baseball in particular presents a number of opportunities to motivate student interest and teach concepts. Several articles have appeared in this journal on this topic, illustrating a wide variety of areas of physics. In addition, several websites and an entire book are available. In this paper we describe a student-designed project that illustrates the relative surface gravity on the Earth, Sun and other solar-system bodies using baseball. We describe the project and its results here as an example of a simple, fun, and student-driven use of baseball to illustrate an important physics principle

Fair-Weather Fans: The Correlation Between Attendance and Winning Percentage

In Rob Neyer\u27s chapter on San Francisco in his Big Book of Baseball Lineups, he speculates that there aren\u27t really good baseball cities, and that attendance more closely correlates with winning percentage than with any other factor. He also suggests that a statistically minded person look at this. I took the challenge and have been playing with a lot of data