For those baseball fans out there looking for a great read, I highly recommend the “The Baseball Same Game: Finding Comparable Players From the National Pastime.” Armed with Lee Sinins’ Sabermetric Baseball Encyclopedia, author Steve Lombardi provides both a statistical and a historical analysis on pairs of players who are statistically comparable.

This book has a little something for every baseball fan. Each player pair are compared statistically, then Mr. Lombardi provides a nice narrative detailing the history of each player and his conclusions on why they’re similar. So the statheads get their stats, the historians get some history, and for those of you like me who are both, you get a ton of useful information.

Probably the most interesting comparisons are those between Hall of Fame players (or near Hall of Fame Players) and those who didn’t make it in. At times it almost seems like the whim of the voters decide who gets in, as opposed to the players accomplishments.

There are plenty of former Tigers, and while I don’t want to give too much away, my favorite pairing was Goose Gossage and John Hiller. Goose Gossage is one of my favorite pitchers (who didn’t throw for the Tigers) and I feel he warrants consideration for the Hall of Fame. John Hiller is one of my all time favorite players, and it was nice to see him matched up favorably with one of the very best.

You can pick up The Baseball Same Game by clicking here. You won’t be disappointed. And you can check out more of Steve’s work at his website NetShrine.com.

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