Sabermetrics, the empirical analysis of baseball statistics made famous by 'Moneyball,' redefined how people evaluate baseball players, overturning a century of assumptions about which metrics matter most.

Explore the data behind every Major League Baseball player's success rate with ABS, its new tech-assisted challenge system.

The 2011 film 'Moneyball' shifted ideas about sports and statistics

Based on the Michael Lewis book of the same name, the film starring Brad Pitt depicts the attempts of the 2002 Oakland A's to leverage data analysis to overcome their low-budget woes ($41M) and compete with big-budget teams like the New York Yankees ($125M). Other sports and leagues, including the NBA and NFL, would adopt a similar logic: find what the market undervalues and exploit it.

Visualize how changes to lineups, driven by modern analytics, could have changed one of MLB's most iconic moments.

Explore some of the best baseball books, including Michael Lewis' influential 'Moneyball' and Bob Uecker's autobiography 'Catcher in the Wry.'

Statcast, MLB's sophisticated real-time data analytics system, runs machine learning models in the 23-second gap between every pitch.

A sophisticated data analysis found that stadiums with roofs or in cities that regularly have sunny skies are the easiest for outfielders to play in.

Inside MLB's robo-umping experiment

Human umpires call roughly 94% of pitches right overall, but performance reduces on borderline pitches in high-leverage moments, the calls that shape game outcomes most. A professor and historian analyze early experiments with the full "robot ump" system that helped shape MLB's decision to implement a compromise "challenge" system.

Henry Chadwick invented the box score in 1859—and wrote off walks as a pitcher's failure

MLB 2023 rules changes were the most dramatic alterations in decades, drastically speeding up the game.

How Shohei Ohtani made baseball fun again

To rise to the level of Major League Baseball in recent decades, a player needs to become a specialist in at least one of the sport's many skills: hitting, pitching, throwing, running, fielding. For decades, this specialization has made a so-called...

The 2026 MLB season is the first to allow players to challenge umpires' calls on balls and strikes.

A 1930s card game birthed modern fantasy sports

"National Pastime" used the statistics of real Major League Baseball players to determine a winner, creating the template for the modern fantasy sports model.

Measuring which nation has the most baseball fans

It's known as America's pastime, but just how devoted are Americans to baseball? FiveThirtyEight outlines several metrics indicating Puerto Rico may have the most devoted fanbase. See how they used an adjusted metric to rank the world's biggest...

How math whizzes exploit sportsbooks

Chris Dirkus is a professional sports bettor who approaches the hobby as a math problem, not from a fan's perspective. He focuses on mispriced odds in popular games where many fans are betting for high liquidity. He's one of a rare segment of sports bettors exploiting slow models and human mistakes.

'Moneyball' author Michael Lewis believes sports betting is a problem for young men

The noted journalist and author of "Moneyball," "The Big Short," and "The Blind Side" has now fixed his discerning eye on the sports-betting industry. In this interview, he explains why he sees sports betting as a problem for American society, especially boys and young men, and why he believes the government needs to regulate the nascent industry more seriously.

Check out a list of the top 100 players in baseball history, from Barry Larkin to Babe Ruth.

Major League Baseball, explained

Major League Baseball is America’s oldest professional sports league. Alongside triumphs, the league has faced scandals, including drug abuse and steroid use, shaping its path over the decades. Today, MLB embraces new rules, international talent, and a growing connection to legalized sports betting.

Fourteen ways to make baseball cool again

Baseball, while commonly known as America's pastime, gets a bit of a bad rap for being long, slow, and boring. Here are fourteen fun ideas to make the sport more interesting to combat dwindling attendance.

Hear how gerrymandering is like 'Moneyball applied to politics'

In a 2016 interview, journalist David Daley explained how Republicans used data-driven targeting after the 2010 census to lock in durable advantages, comparing modern gerrymandering strategies to the analytics revolution in baseball.

The evolution of the baseball bat

Torpedo bats may be the latest, most powerful kind of baseball bat, but the instrument's history is long. This Smithsonian resource traces the bat's evolution from handmade objects forged by the players to mass-produced marvels of physics designed by companies like Louisville Slugger. Along the way, you'll see some interesting takes on the form, including bats referred to as "mushrooms" and "bananas."

Decoding sports-betting language

The world of sports gambling is filled with insider lingo: What's a "spread"? How about a "moneyline" or a "parlay"? This resource breaks down the jargon, helping you navigate the industry or, at least, giving you the keys to talk about it.

100 moments that shaped baseball history

Published in 2018 by baseball historian Jacob Kornhauser, this list examines the defining moments throughout more than a century of play on the field, from Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Dock Ellis purportedly throwing a no-hitter while on acid to Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier.

In 1975, a Major League Baseball clause that kept players legally tied to their teams after retirement was dismantled, creating the modern concept of free agency.

Ranking valuations of NBA teams

NBA teams were worth a total of $138B in 2024, with the Golden State Warriors the highest-valued at over $9B, according to research and analysis conducted by sports business outlet Sportico. Dive into the data with this write-up and visualization.

Before 1920, during the Deadball Era, a single baseball was used throughout a Major League game, leading to a notoriously dirty style of play.

Integration of Latino players in MLB

The Senators’ spectacular losing record obscures one of the most important stories in baseball history: the club’s role in integrating Latino players into the major leagues

"Guessing what the pitcher is going to throw is 80 percent of being a successful hitter. The other 20 percent is just execution."

- Baseball star Hank Aaron (1934-2021)

MLB pitchers were charged with benefiting from sports betting

In November 2025, two pitchers for the Cleveland Guardians were charged with coordinating with sports bettors to enrich themselves and others. In many instances, they shared the kinds of pitches they would throw at specific points in the game. Bettors then placed money on those actions.

A Bay Area lab was supplying MLB players with steroids

The Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative, also known as BALCO, began as a modest vitamin shop, but by the 1990s it was at the center of a doping scheme that rocked Major League Baseball and other professional sports.

Each July 1, six-time Major League Baseball All-Star Bobby Bonilla gets $1.19M from the New York Mets, thanks to a 25-year-long deferred payment agreement.

How fantasy baseball fights the loneliness epidemic

Experts believe the erosion of traditional community organizations has led to a loneliness epidemic. This deep dive explores how fantasy baseball has filled the gap for some men, providing a stand-in social network.

'I swing big, with everything I've got. I hit big or I miss big. I like to live as big as I can.'

- Baseball legend Babe Ruth (1895-1948)

Sidearm pitchers—who throw the ball at an odd angle, sometimes very close to the ground—are a rarity in modern baseball, which often makes them more difficult for batters to hit.

A history of the rare, chaotic moments when MLB batters charge the pitcher on the mound

They typically occur when a pitcher has slung a pitch a little too close to the batter—though the exact causes vary, from quick tempers to longstanding grudges. No definitive account of these infrequent but highly visible incidents has existed, so sportswriter Jon Bois compiled data on 264 such moments between 1950 and 2025. The resulting 23-minute video explores the rich narratives leading to these charged events.

Fantasy sports' roots go back to an 1860s parlor game that simulated real-world baseball.

Some say baseball's drug problem goes back to the late 1800s

At age 32, pitcher James “Pud” Galvin was feeling tired and decided to take "the Brown-Séquard elixir," which contained a testicular fluid from dogs and guinea pigs, believed to invigorate tired bodies. It might've worked: Galvin pitched a two-hit shutout the next day.

'Scorigami' attempts to chart every NFL game score

The rules of the sport set bounds on possible final outcomes, so this adept statistician mined some fascinating takeaways. Some scores are impossible (like 5 to 1) and some are more common (like 20-17, occurring over 300 times since 1944). Watch for a deluge of numbers.

How baseball shaped Black America during Reconstruction

A cornerstone of the budding Black culture following the Civil War was baseball, with several clubs springing up in Black neighborhoods and leaders like Frederick Douglass cheering on the players, including his son, who played for a team in Washington. This detailed history of the early Black leagues unpacks how the game enhanced the upwardly mobile community—and why that fact led to the segregation of what would become Major League Baseball.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

Americans spent nearly $150B in sports-related bets in 2024

These bets ranged from who would win the World Series to what color clothes famous celebrities would wear to the Super Bowl. Experts believe the industry will continue to grow.

Where you fall on the sports misery index

Only one team can win it all each season, which means the majority of fans are disappointed. This bot mines the data on how your teams have performed in recent years and measures your misery index (the higher, the more miserable).

Sports media have also embraced sports betting

For decades, ESPN kept its distance between reporting on games and talking about gambling lines. Sports teams refused to have franchises in Las Vegas, fearing it would harm the sport. But since 2018, that has changed. ESPN’s personalities regularly pick games, and the company has also launched its own betting app.

Early MBA curricula were influenced by a movement in ‘scientific management’

The Scientific Management movement was pioneered by Frederick Winslow Taylor in the early 1900s and posited managers should take a scientific approach to work, studying each task and system in the workplace from an objective lens. It’s still considered the backbone of modern management practices.

How Seabiscuit's DNA made him a winner

Seabiscuit's sudden success in the sport has been framed as a classic against-the-odds sports story. One Binghamton University molecular physiologist wanted to go a bit deeper, though, to see how much genetics played a role in the horse's legendary career. Using the horse's silvered hooves, his research team discovered that Seabiscuit's genotype was typically associated with late bloomers, a finding confirmed by the horse's track record.

Sports leagues have attempted to prevent athletes from betting

As pro and collegiate sports embrace betting (and the revenue that comes with it), each league works diligently to ensure the integrity of the games by hiring private firms to analyze irregular bets. These companies have flagged bets that led to the firing of Alabama’s baseball coach, the suspension of multiple athletes at Iowa and Iowa State, and, most recently, a lifetime ban on former Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter by the NBA in April 2024.

A visual guide to identifying baseball's pitches, from common pitches like 'fastball' and the 'change up' to specialty types, like 'cutter' and 'slurve.'

The MLB's reserve clause gave owners rights to players after their contracts expired

The clause was added to contracts in 1879, allowing owners to hang on to players after the expiration of their contracts, sometimes in perpetuity.

Some athletes warm up with equipment from other sports

Baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani uses a cricket bat; his teammate Yoshinobu Yamamoto throws a javelin. Quarterback CJ Stroud shoots free throws. The reasons are partially physical (it's good to exercise different parts of your body) and partially mental (it's nice to take the pressure off with someone else's game).

'Out in left field' is an idiom used to describe an eccentric person, and some researchers believe it likely originated at a minor league baseball park in Massachusetts that had an unusual outfield.

Every MLB baseball needs to be rubbed with a special kind of mud, provided by one New Jersey family.