Ask the Author: Derek Bain
Answered Questions (2)
Derek Bain
Individual books are under consideration but I don't have any concrete plans at this time. I just completed a book with co-author John Racanelli covering the history of baseball video games and electronic handhelds, titled "Hardball Retro’s Compendium of Baseball Video Games and Electronic Handhelds". Please check it out!
Derek Bain
My fascination with baseball and video games began in the early 1980's. Our family received an Intellivision for Christmas in 1981 and I spent the better part of the next two years playing and acquiring games for the system. In 1983 I acquired a Commodore 64 which sparked a lifelong interest in programming and baseball simulations. One of my early favorites was MicroLeague Baseball which allowed you to manage a team, trade players and compile statistics. Several years later we acquired an Apple IIe computer and I discovered Earl Weaver Baseball. An amazing step forward in baseball simulations, you could generate your own stadiums, create schedules and on the Amiga version, the game would allow you to tweak the pronunciation of each player's name! Years later I purchased a PC and spent numerous hours with the Tony LaRussa Baseball and APBA (Baseball for Windows) games.
When I was playing computer baseball simulations I always found myself tinkering with the team rosters and lineups. I usually ended up creating All-Time teams for each franchise. I began writing a few articles about the Angels for Seamheads in 2010 and I was working on another project when I found myself asking the question, "what if I put every baseball player on their original team, and tried to determine who had the best and worst organizations on a yearly basis?" After reading "Baseball Hacks" by Joseph Adler, I realized that I could merge the Lahman Baseball Database with the Transactions Database on Retrosheet along with the Baseball Gauge @ Seamheads to accomplish this task. I spent countless hours crunching the data, first incorporating the Pythagorean Winning Percentage, and later Wins Above Replacement and Win Shares. I am thrilled to share the results with the baseball and sabermetric community!
When I was playing computer baseball simulations I always found myself tinkering with the team rosters and lineups. I usually ended up creating All-Time teams for each franchise. I began writing a few articles about the Angels for Seamheads in 2010 and I was working on another project when I found myself asking the question, "what if I put every baseball player on their original team, and tried to determine who had the best and worst organizations on a yearly basis?" After reading "Baseball Hacks" by Joseph Adler, I realized that I could merge the Lahman Baseball Database with the Transactions Database on Retrosheet along with the Baseball Gauge @ Seamheads to accomplish this task. I spent countless hours crunching the data, first incorporating the Pythagorean Winning Percentage, and later Wins Above Replacement and Win Shares. I am thrilled to share the results with the baseball and sabermetric community!
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