I have not read this book, but as a chess fan I would like to say that you need to have a large sample size before you can pass judgement using statistics. This is how Professor Arpad Elo (inventor of the Gaussian Elo distribution in chess) made chess a highly predictable encounter. With Sabermetrics and the A's, Bluejays, etc, perhaps the same will happen in baseball as in chess. But you need to have a large sample size, and the problem with baseball is physical injuries can make stats obsolete overnight (not as true in mind games, although chess players on occasion do go insane, and age is a factor even in chess). So there is always the element of chance in sport. But professional management is long overdue, considering how much money is spent in this sport.

All in all a good book. I might even read it; also I recommend Michael Lewis' Moneyball.

Overall, this is a valuable book to a baseball historian. I learned what the actual lefty righty variations are in batting averages, homers, and walks. In other words, how lefty pitching affects lefty hitting, etc. And I learned how people hit when they have worked themselves into different ball-strike counts. The best batting averages come at the count of 3-1. There is a lot of emphasis on fielding range as measured by how many balls the fielders managed to get to.

In such a comprehensive book you want to believe everything in it and accept it as some kind of Bible. But you'd better not. The book has a few flaws in it.

For example, it ranks Sandy Koufax as a non-entity. While admitting that his pitching was good, it rips him to shreds because he couldn't hit, and wasn't a great fielder either. My reaction is so what if he couldn't hit. And as for his fielding, first of all, when you strike out so many hitters you don't get as many chances to field the ball, and second of all, pitchers handle so few batted balls to begin with that the sampling isn't that significant. If your system ends up saying Koufax was nothing, there is something wrong with your system. Koufax was among the elite of baseball history. I rank him as the second best pitcher who ever lived, behind Walter Johnson. He was God on the mound, and you don't just brush that off. He was more devastating than Randy Johnson. He had the best curve ball I've ever seen. If you went against him, you lost. The SF Giants didn't want to match Marichal against Koufax. Why waste Marichal on an automatic loss. Believe me, they would have matched Marichal against anyone else. To put my comments in perspective, I was never a Dodger fan.

This updated version of The Hidden Game of Baseball is a great addition to any baseball library, whether the fan be of the casual variety or the die-hard. It introduces the reader to a new and unique way of rating the players of today and yesterday and can even be used to compare players from different eras to determine who really was the best: Mark McGwire or Babe Ruth? A must read! Highly recommended!

This book is excellent for any type of baseball fan. It has wonderful photos with excellent information. It is truly a worth-wild buy for baseball fans, no matter what the age!

This "Piping Systems, Drafting and Design" is good enought for technical reference, such as up to dated Standard, etc.

Don't expect to find a football book you can use exclusively from the rest. This is a good supplement to books like "The Pro Football Encyclopedia" (by Maher/Gill). If you're into statistics this is one of the best to have. Whereas "Pro Football Encyclopedia" has players longest gains, which this book doesn't, this book gives you kickoff and punt return stats for all players, the encyclopedia doesn't. This book is mainly about the NFL. I bought it for the statistics. It's also a good book to use if you want to find out more about a specific player (statistically speaking). Chapters like "The 25 Most Memorable Regular Season Games" and "The 300 Greatest Players" etc.. are not what I got this book for. I would prefer a book that leaves out author's opinions. I've seen games I'll never forget that I knew wouldn't make the list and also players. Although these chapters are somewhat interesting along with others I could live without half this book easily but like I said, it's a good season by season individual stat book that has information other books don't. It mainly depends on what you're buying this book for. There are statistics here excluded from other books but there are stats left out that ARE in other books, like blocked punts for instance, which may not seem to matter to most, but it all depends on what you're buying it for. It has stats other books don't, that's what I bought it for.

This is a reference book, and a darn good one, but they could have trimmed a couple of hundred pages of heft by leaving out the a lot of the subjective content. For example their list of the best 300 players of all time is pure opinion, albiet educated opinion. The section on strategy was outdated almost as soon as it was printed.

That's a minor complaint, though. I use it extensively in research for the book I'm writing. Its guide to the stadiums that teams have used over the years is by far the best, most complete out there (although, another small criticism, they could have summarized the info in a table for quicker reference)

Clearly not for the casual fan, but a great arguement settler for the serious football fan.

This book is a must have for all serious football fans. It is the most complete one volume source of information about professional football.

My favorite sections include:

History of the game: The introductory essays on the history of pro football and the complete histories of each team is fascinating and an important context for many of the conventions and the culture of today's game.

History of players: Not only is there a complete roster of every player who has ever played in the National Football
League and it's antecedents, there are more detailed biographies of the "500 greatest players" as determined by the panel of writers responsible for this encyclopedia.

Complete game summaries of and statistics for all the playoffs, Super Bowls, and most important games in league history: I personally found this the most nostalgic reading, as I could remember where I was and who I was watching the playoffs and Super Bowls with.

And much, much more -- some more mundane (essays on player equipment) and some more interesting (history of defunct leagues like the United States Football League (USFL)).

I do have two complaints about the encyclopedia -- one minor and one a glaring omission.

My minor complaint is that they need a better copy editor. I found many typos, especially the detailed information about playoffs and Super Bowls.

My major complaint is that is has a woefully incomplete section detailing the individual records (most rushing yards in a game, etc.) which is a terrible omission. I can find a more complete listing of individual and team records in a sports almanac. A book purporting to be TOTAL FOOTBALL shouldn't need a companion book to round it out and have all the facts one might want at hand. I strongly recommend they improve on this in the next volume.