NPB Tracker

And now for a special announcement. This year, I’ll be taking part in a couple of events at MLB Spring Training in Arizona hosted by my friends at Fangraphs. If you happen to be in the Phoenix area on March 11-12, I hope to see you there.

For the rest of this plug, I will borrow heavily steal directly from the great Dave Cameron’s event announcement at Fangraphs:

FanGraphs Live At Goodyear Ballpark – Friday, March 11th, 10:30 a.m.

Get your nose out of that spreadsheet and watch a game… with a bunch of other people who also like spreadsheets.

On Friday, March 11th, the FanGraphs staff will descend on beautiful Goodyear Ballpark to watch a game between the Cleveland Indians and the Seattle Mariners. Prior to the game, we will be hosting a Q&A with several notable members of the Cleveland Indians baseball operations staff, and then our team of writers will be hanging out in a group area for the rest of the day to watch the game. Included in your admission to this event:

* Pre-Game Q&A with members of the Cleveland Indians front office

* Early admission to the park before the gates open to the public.

* Unlimited ballpark food and non-alcoholic beverages

* Approximately 4 1/2 hours of time hanging out with more than 15 members of the FanGraphs and RotoGraphs staff.

* A highly competitive baseball game between two titans of the American League. Or, at least, nine innings of baseball.

FanGraphs Live In Phoenix – Saturday, March 12th, 6:30 p.m.

Don’t want to watch a baseball game and eat unlimited amounts of food, but still want to hang out with the FanGraphs crowd? We can do that too. On Saturday, March 12th, from 6:30 to 9:30 pm, we will be hosting panel discussions with members of the FanGraphs and RotoGraphs staff, as well as several notable executives from various Major League front offices. They’ll talk about how statistical analysis plays a role in their decision making with their respective clubs, we’ll talk about how awesome heat maps are, and the RotoGraphs guys will talk ADP and other fantasy related topics.

The room we’ve rented for the event is slightly larger than a starter home, so space is somewhat limited. This will likely be a more intimate affair, as much as a collection of baseball statgeeks getting together on a Saturday evening can be considered intimate. Admission to this event will include:

* A chair

* A chance to ask questions of some pretty interesting people

* The right to awkwardly hang around after the event ends and see if the group ends up going to any drinking establishments nearby.