Welcome!

Welcome to “What’s on Second”

After years of toying with the idea of having my own baseball web site, I’ve finally decided the time was right to share my thoughts with the rest of the baseball-loving public. The fact that my first book will be hitting bookshelves in a city or town near you early in 2008 had a lot to do with it as well, but my love of writing and baseball history demanded that I finally launch my site, so here we are.

Now that you’re here, you’d probably like to know who we are and what we’re about. I say “we” because I’m not the only seamhead who will be contributing to the site; there are others out there just like me (a scary thought, I know) and some have already agreed to write articles, blog on a semi-regular basis, analyze stats, and design databases for your enjoyment.

So who are we and what are we about? Seamheads.com is the antithesis of Fox Sports. Twelve years ago when Fox bought the rights to air Major League Baseball games on its network, then company president David Hill laid down the law, “If anyone talks about dead guys during a broadcast, I’ll sack ‘em,” Hill promised his broadcast team. “I’m sick of dead guys! Whenever I turn on a baseball game, all I hear about is dead guys. If I hear a name, I’m gonna ask, ‘Is he dead?’ And if he is, you’re fired. You’re all fired!”

We at Seamheads.com embrace dead guys. We celebrate dead guys. We love dead guys (in a strictly platonic sense, of course)! Here you’ll find stories about dead guys, anecdotes about dead guys, statistical analysis about dead guys; you name it, dead guys will be prominently featured here. We love the history of the game and think it should be celebrated, not swept under the carpet and ignored.

But we’re not just about dead guys and the game’s history. We’re equally passionate about today’s teams, players, and topics. I’m a diehard Red Sox fan, who is clinging to the hope that the Sox won’t pull a 1978 on me and force me to endure another tragic collapse like the one I witnessed when I was 11 (Editor’s note: The Sox hung on and captured their first division title since 1995. Mike is still searching for the sharp objects he hid during the impending collapse). Kevin Johnson, our resident stat guru, is a Cardinals fan, and our web designer, Kevin Saelee, is a Giants fan. You’re just as likely to find me ranting about Terry Francona’s insistence on using Eric Gagne in crucial situations as you are to find me writing about Smoky Joe Wood or the history of the trade deadline (well, maybe not just as likely, but I try to scatter current events throughout the site as much as possible). Regardless of the era or the topic, what you’ll find here are well-researched, well-written articles that are intended to educate, inform, and entertain. Most of us are members of SABR and we take our baseball seriously. It’s our passion and I hope it shows through in our writing.

This blog section will feature full-length articles posted on a regular (but not daily) basis as well as beer-fueled rants inspired by yet another Eric Gagne meltdown and less emotional and more logical entries from our resident stat guru, Kevin Johnson, explaining the odds of a five-run comeback in the seventh inning or later on the road against a first place team (yes, I’m still bitter about the Red Sox blowing a 7-2 lead to the Yankees at Fenway Park on September 14).

As you navigate the site you’ll see five navigation buttons at the top of the page, most of which are self-explanatory. “Home” just takes you back to this welcome page; “About Us” contains three brief bios of the main contributors to the site; “Diamond Kings” is an historic fantasy simulation league that I established about seven years ago and has its own web site; “Message Board” is a forum I set up at which baseball fans can gather and discuss the game, its history, different ways to analyze the game, or other topics not related to baseball; “Articles” will simply take you to all the articles that will be featured on the site. The sidebar includes links to our favorite sites and will be updated as we find more that are informative, compelling, and/or entertaining.

We hope you enjoy the site!