Scoresheet baseball has come a long way since I first wrote an article on the best websites for your Scoresheet needs. Each league, now, has its own website with links to a fantastic web of sites allowing you to analyze your team, the other teams, and have access to current major and minor league stats on your players.

There is, also, a longer and longer list of sites which are worthwhile companions, but you could boil it down to only a few necessary ones. And all, but the two least essential listed below are free!

Not necessary, but most fun is http://sports.groups.yahoo.com/group/mcscoresheet/ .

These Yahoo Group posts vary off and on topic from a great mix of Scoresheet wizzes. Be warned of conversasions veering into religion or politics. Another warning is for the new half-dressed picture of Jessica Alba or some babe each week, although, it doesn’t get kinkier than that. Ken Warren, Brian Fawcett, Medea Child, John R. Mayne, and Ari are among the star wizzes. You’ll hear a lot from me, too. Along with Ken, Brian, me, and the learned Erwin Hunke, the group has a very strong Canadian point of view – and sense of humor. (I’m actually a dual citicizen and not nearly as funny as Brian and Ken.) Eric Woodman and others report from Boston. Paul Thompson and others report from New York. (Paul gets really upset when we tease him about the Yankees). Todd Melander is a Twins expert. Level-headed peace-making moderator MC is from southern California. He is needed as some discusions can get pretty heated. Andy Cleary is at large to pick apart logical components. Members include judges, scientists, mathematicians, and writers.

For another fantastic Yahoo Group which posts only on Scoresheet topics: http://sports.groups.yahoo.com/group/scoresheet-talk/. The tone here is more straight baseball advice and analysis. You get the same bunch minus Medea Child, plus moderators, Graham Hudson and reliable authority Brian (Dewberry) Jones, and a larger army of Scoresheet enthusiasts including professional baseball consultant Gary Huckabay. Even the Scoresheet creating and operating Barton brothers contribute to set us straight on their game. Come here for a broad view of opinions regarding your keeper list, pending trades, prospects, Scoresheet rules, etc. Mcscoresheet has a fraction of the members as scoresheet-talk, but no fewer postings and certainly no less expert advice.

The members of Scoresheet-talk built some very useful tools and made them available:

http://www.scoresheet.com/FOR_WWW/LR_diffs.txt Directly applicable Scoresheet platoon splits.

http://pala.wburke.ws/vote/show.php is a January poll on best players at each position (plus prospects and crossovers). You don’t need to do any homework. Just use this list!

http://www.bballdeluxe.com/ Ray McKelvie’s B Ball Deluxe is skewed towards Scoresheet players. It includes a link to the poll mentioned above and a link to order the most accurate projections tested: Ken Warren’s Ballpark Figures. http://www.bballdeluxe.com/_borders/warren_book_05.gif

http://www.attheplate.com/ss_home.htm For Scoresheet History, links to some web based Scoresheet Leagues, and tips and stuff similar to my own web site, do give Jay-Dell Mah’s home a bookmark.

News delivery: http://rotoworld.com/content/playernews.asp?sport=MLB Rotoworld is still king. The really good funny quips are less frequent, but they are still coming. The coverage is as comprehensive as ever and the analysis is still bang-on astute. You will have to adjust some comments for their Rotisserie orientation. If half the major league teams consulted Rotoworld (or some of the wiser members of these Scoresheet Yahoo groups) before making their deals or signings, they’d be better off – financially, if not in wins.

Statistics: It depends what you want.

http://rotoworld.com/content/playernews.asp?sport=MLB Rotoworld is good for a quick reference on a player’s current stats in the majors. It’s the best site for current injury and contract histories. It gives current minor league stats for players who spent part of the season in the minors and it breaks down the number of games played at each position. The drawback is that the stats are Rotisserie geared, not very useful for Scoresheet analysis. (In fact, if Rotisserie players were as knowledgable as Scoresheet players, it wouldn’t be good enough for them, either.)

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players ESPN has the most comprehensive major league stats. Slugging Against for pitchers is my new pet stat as the perfect compliment to K:BB. Besides every imaginable hitting and pitching stat, you get a picture, a pronounciation guide, and year by year fielding stats – including le crème de la crème: Zone ratings.

http://www.forecaster.ca/thestar/baseball/index.cgi  From the Toronto Star comes the new kid on the block: WayMoreSports. It also has pictures of the players and most stats you’d ever want. (For pitchers, I substitute a quick glance at HR and Hits for SlgA.) The main advantage of this site over ESPN is that it includes career minor league stats. For anyone in the majors less than three years, you have to check what they did down there. http://www.forecaster.ca/thestar/baseball/playerindex.cgi I have the Player Index bookmarked, but there are other useful features as well. The number of players available here is, also, vastly larger than on ESPN, but it’s not every minor leaguer who you might want to check out.    

http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/default.asp For the rest, I use the Baseball Cube. This includes not only every minor leaguer, but college players, and retired players. The minor league stats aren’t in, yet, for players who go back further than a dozen years, but you can look up anybody who played professional baseball. The stats are plentiful (not as many as ESPN, but more than WayMoreSports). Another cool feature is that there are cross references by colleges, high schools, and places of birth.

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/ Baseball America is the best source for knowing what professional scouts see in prospects. That does cost a few dollars, but worth it as far as my enjoyment budget goes. Stats can’t tell you everything - yet.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/sbstix.htm If you want a list of just major leaguers and their essential stats listed by team, not one player one page at a time, then go to the good old stand-by USA Today’s baseball stats. They were the first, and they do have the most useful post-season stats. Their stats are nicely archived, too.

http://www.forecaster.ca/thestar/baseball/teamindex.cgi Depth charts are important for guessing playing time. This is really just as important as qualitative stat projections, although, far more difficult. Rotoworld has always been the most accurate and up-to-date, so far, but I caught an instance or two this winter, where I thought WayMoreSports was right and Rotoworld was not. It is absurdly tricky getting to the depth charts in Rotoworld – I have each one bookmarded individually. WayMoreSports has them all available from their Team Index.

http://www.rototimes.com/tracker/index.php Each league’s Scoresheet site gives all your player’s current stats in full view. However, if you want to isolate who is hot (if there is such a thing) Team Tracker does the best job. It is a pay site, however. If the site I provided doesn’t get you there, just pair everything off after “.com”.

http://www.mlb.com/ Major League baseball has finally arrived in the computer age and is going gung-ho. It’s full of propaganda, of course, but you might want to try out their sortable stat functions. This is a good source for records and Hall of Fame stuff at the very least. Let’s hope they aren’t going to scare all this competition away with their new agreement.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/ Finally, this is not Scoresheet essential or even helpful, but I have to share it. As a teenager, and a few years between jobs as an adult, I would chart the starting players (and their benches) for every major league team for every year, so on one page (containing about 10 years at a time) you can see the transitions at each position from one player to the next. Someone at Baseball Reference has finally done this – in a cruder way than I had done, but it is basically the same idea. You will find some career stats here not in Baseball Cube, and could discover some other gems.

By the way, please, share your favorites with me: x8please@rogers.com.