Baseball Boss invites you to simulate the 2008 World Series at their web site.

My latest column at SportingNews.com looks at the new catchers in the league.

My latest column at SportingNews.com looks at a way to predict RBI, taking into consideration the ability of the players batting in front of the power hitter to drive in runs.

One thing that amazed me during the writing was how much Jeff Francoeur hurt the Braves this season. The Braves have only been outscored 612-590; they should be around a .500 team, not a .435 team. With any kind of decent power from Francoeur, the Braves likely add 30 runs. With all the one-run losses, those 30 runs could be huge. Instead of looking to build a team for next year, they'd likely be in the Marlins spot, on the edge of the playoff race.

The Supreme Court declined to hear the CDM case. Fantasy operators can continue to use stats without paying a license fee. MLBAM really shot themselves in the foot on this one.

Update: It's not only MLBAM that suffers here, but the players union as well. When the MLBPA issued the licenses, they were fairly sensible about it. Both sides knew that the player's rights to limit the data represented a gray area, so the MLBPA kept the rights fees low enough that no one would challenge them. MLBAM, on the other hand, tried to drive the competition out of business. At that point, it became worth the cost to litigate. Now, neither the owners nor players will see any money from outside fantasy operators.

The best name for a fantasy league ever.

Beyond the Boxscore postulates that Corey Hart might be an underrated baseball player.

About a week ago I was doing a little research for a fantasy site and thought I'd look for players who might drive in lots of runs because they were batting behind two high OBA hitters. One of them was Hart, who is likely to follow Braun and Fielder in the Brewers batting order. Given Anderson's graph at the link, he might be someone you should consider drafting.

Baseball Musings is holding a pledge drive in March.

Roster Magazine premired today:

Featured columns were contributed by Maury Brown, Derek Carty, Pizza Cutter, Daniel Rathman and Eric Seidman.

Mock draft participants included Pete Abbate, Knox Bardeen, Tony Bartlett, David Chase, Eric Hinz, Cory Humes, Tim McLeod, Derek Nelson, Zach Piso, Brad Stewart, Bob Taylor and Edwin Van Bibber-Orr.

Team profiles were written by Jonathan Aicardi, Joe Aiello, Ryan Armbrust, Jessica Bader, Matt Bandi, Matt Birnbach, Jay Capron, Dan Carey, E.J. Fagan, Bill Ferris, Clark Fosler, Lisa Gray, David Hannes, Zach Hayes, Cory Humes, Joey Matschulat, Jim McLennan, Daniel Rathman, Eric SanInocencio, Aaron Sapiro, Will Schaffer, Stoeten, Ryan Van Bibber, Shawn Weaver and Geoff Young.

The next panel features:

• Mark Kortekaas, CBS Interactive
• Jeff Ma, Protrade
• Andy Andres, BaseballHQ
• Chris Lee, Moderator, "The Winner's Guide to Fantasy Baseball"

Gaming Panel
Photo: David Pinto, Baseball Musings

Update: CBS hasn't noticed a fall off in their fantasy games due to free games on ESPN. People who left came back.

Update: Jeff Ma wonders how you make a game both simple and compelling.

Update: Andy Andres just referred to fantasy friends, the people who you talk to about fantasy sports. This is different than imaginary friends, who wear i when they play sports.

Update: None of the panelists have seen any falloff from the various sports scandals.

Update: How do you forecast players in a changing drug environment? There's a big debate going on at BaseballHQ as to how to do this, or even if you can do this.

Update: I asked Jeff how you make a game simple but compelling. He says you need a game that allows players to make a lot of decisions without forcing them to make a lot of decisions.

Update: Jeff Ma suggests if you want to start a new company, use something like Facebook.

Update: Fantasy players love Juan Pierre because he steals a lot of bases.

Brock for Broglio offers his 101 favorite fantasy team names.

The Fantasy Baseball industry won a huge decision yesterday:

A federal appeals court upheld a lower court ruling Tuesday that lets a fantasy baseball company use players' names and statistics without paying a licensing fee.

In a 2-1 decision, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled that CBC Distribution and Marketing Inc. doesn't have to pay the players, even though it profits by using their names and statistics.

...

Telscher said the facts and figures are public information. He said it's no different from media outlets that print game tallies to draw readers and make money.

"When you're using mass information, it's protected under the First Amendment," he said.

MLBAM screwed this up royally. The MLBPA used to run this, and allowed any company to buy a license at a reasonable price. MLBAM took this over and started jacking up the price to drive out competition. Now, a nice revenue stream for the MLBPA is gone. On top of that, MLBAM's fantasy game is going to need to compete with others on price and performance! They are going to need to make people want to play their game, instead of just forcing them to play their game by eliminating the competition. Great news all around.

My original thoughts on the subject are here.

John Spinda at Kent State University is conducting a survey on fantasy sports and why people play them. If you'd like to help out, you can take the survey by clicking here.

NBC Fantasy Fix invited me to talk about over achievers today. Find out why Aaron Rowand is the Forrest Gump of the baseball world. :-)

The Saberoticians is a new blog devoted to fantasy baseball. Check it out if you're involved in the game.

A reader send me this request, which I pass on to the audience:

Thanks so much for your help! I am looking to put together a 2007 Major League Baseball Pool/Game that has each player predict the final standings for each MLB division as well as every team's regular season record. Based upon a player's regular season's prediction they then choose divisional match-ups and winners, LCS match-ups and winners, and the World Series match-up and winner.

I was trying to think of a point system that would suffice. For example, if you guess the winner of the NL East you get 5 points; if you guess the 2nd place finisher of the NL East you get 4 pts, 3rd place 3 pts, 4th place 2 pts, last place 1 point. Then I was thinking if you guess a team's EXACT regular season record you get 10 points, a record within 5 games of the real record you get 5 points, 6 games 4 points, 7 games 3 points, 8 games 2 points, 9 games 1 point, then 0 points for anything worse....

Then there would also be point levels allotted to correct playoff predictions........

It can get a little complicated and I was wondering if any of your readers is involved with anything like this or if anyone knows of anything like this that is offered online.

If you can help him out, leave a message in the comments.

Baseball Musings is holding a pledge drive in March.

Tony Finn at SI.com wants fantasy players to note the boost you can receive from selecting 27 year olds.

Roto Authority is selling a spreadsheet of projections for baseball fantasy players to help them with the 2007 draft. If you buy through the above link, Baseball Musings gets a commission. From the site:

Every year, you buy three eight dollar magazines to give you an edge in your fantasy baseball draft. These things go to press in mid-December and are terribly outdated by the time your draft day arrives in March. And if your magazine missed an important player who comes up in June? Too bad.

It doesn't have to be that way - the 2007 RotoAuthority Fantasy Baseball Guide is now available for just $9.99. This robust downloadable spreadsheet is packed with features that will help you dominate your league.

If you're interested in fantasy games, check it out.

Johnny Damon is the commissioner of a new gaming league in which fans get to play their favorite video games against professional baseball players:

Yankees center fielder Johnny Damon has announced formation of the Professional Baseball Video Game League, in which some of baseball's best players will battle each other and their fans online.

Damon will serve as commissioner for the league's inaugural season, which kicks off this week with the first competitions on the league's chosen game, Microsoft's Project Gotham Racing 3 for Xbox 360.

That sounds like a very cool idea.

Fantasy baseball players enjoy the game as much as the real ballplayers. Thanks to Suzanne for the link!

A commenter left this message here.

CDM wins lawsuit against MLB today. Judge rules in CDM's favor. A win for all fantasy sports.

I can't find a news story about this. Does anyone have a link, or can anyone confirm this news?

Update: Ben Kabak supplied this link in the comments. MLBAM shot itself in the foot, as I suspected might be the case:

It's my opinion that MLBAM should have kept the fees low and encouraged more fantasy games. Fantasy games are a growth industry; they create fans for major league baseball, and those fans spend money in the MLB.com store, attend MLB games and watch the advertising during broadcasts that keeps the teams running. They should be encouraging the growth of the industry with low license fees. If a court finds that the MLBAM has no right to license the stats, they'll end up with nothing.

The Players Association had a nice little business going here. They sold that to MLBAM, and now neither is getting a penny. They should take some blame, also:

I'm even more disappointed in the MLBPA. I still believe they are the best union in the world, but they need to understand that the value of their players comes from fans wanting to watch them perform. More people playing fantasy games means more eyeballs to watch them pitch and hit. It would be nice if the MLBPA stepped in and said, "This wasn't what we had in mind when we gave you the exclusive."

If you want to start a fantasy baseball game, now's the time. Congratulations to CDM for increasing competition in the fantasy game market!

ArmChairGM presents a fun and difficult game. Come up with a roster where all players come from different teams, and each last name starts with a different letter of the alphabet!

The Computer Simulated Fantasy Baseball League (CSFBL) just integrated the lineup analzyer into their site. Thanks, and I hope it's helpful to all the fantasy players out there!

Jesse Draper researches the relationship between fantasy baseball and pop culture. He's conducting a poll of on-line fantasy players for his thesis. If you play fantasy games, take a minute to drop by and contribute some information.

Vernon Wells hit two home runs today and drove in four runs to help the Blue Jays defeat the Mets 7-4. Wells is now batting .321 with a .384 OBA and a .625 slugging percentage, a great year. But Wells must drive fantasy players crazy. At age 24, he had a superb season, putting up high batting averages and power number, and a decent OBA. When a player performs like that as he enters his peak years, the skies the limit. I'm sure he was picked high in a few fantasy drafts going into the 2004 season. But he declined. At age 26, he declined again. So he's 27 in 2006 with his stats going the wrong way for his age and I bet a large number of fantasy owners passed him over. How many of you picked up Vernon in the late rounds? You must really be happy.

If Wells were foreign born I'd suspect he was older than the numbers stated, but it's pretty difficult to lie about that now, especially for American citizens.

Ben Kabak links to Alan Schwarz's latest on the legal battle between MLBAM and small fantasy baseball operators. I hope you'll read both. Ben's position is one I agree with; MLBAM should be doing everything to encourage as much fantasy play as possible. They should be encouraging competition among the small providers with licenses based on the number of players. That way, the good ones will grow, and MLB will reap the profits from that growth. The path MLB is going down might very well kill the golden goose.

WhatIfSports.com removed the names of all union players from its new simulations due to licensing issues with MLBAM. Thanks to Brian Harper for the link.

Maury Brown at The Hardball Times provides a nice summary of the fight so far over the fair use of player names and statistics by fantasy baseball operators.

It case you've been away and missed the announcement, Baseball Musings has a new partner, eFantasy Software. Using their engine, I'm now able to offer fantasy games on this site in all four major sports. If you like fantasy games and want to help support this site, this is a great way to contribute. You can also find the link in the sidebar under Partners. Enjoy!

Baseball Musings is happy to announce a new business partner, eFantasySoftware. Using their engine, I'm now able to offer fantasy games on this site in all four major sports. If you like fantasy games and want to help support this site, this is a great way to contribute. You can also find the link in the sidebar under Partners. Enjoy!

If you are interested in joining a play-by-email Strat-o-matic league, check out the PWBL.

A new affiliates program came my way this morning. Team Hub is offering a fantasy game based on team statistics. Their weekly game is simple and challenging. You pick 16 offensive and 16 defensive stats, and decide if your team is going to do better, equal, or worse than their opponents that week. Team Hub is also building a community where fans can interact with sports writers and blogs. If you join, include pinto@baseballmusings in the offer code and this site will receive $5. There is a special that's going on now through April 10th that allows you to play the baseball season for $25.

Since they're not paying me for this promotion (the people who will join are doing that), let me issue my concerns about the site. They're trying to build traffic through a pyramid scheme. You join, you refer five people and your membership is free. That of course is only true if your friends haven't joined already. Also, your membership automatically renews unless you cancel. So remember, if you join and find you don't like the site, it's up to you to stop them taking more money next year.

That said, they certainly are offering a unique fantasy game. They supply the statistics you need week-to-week to help make decisions. It's worth a look.

Statsology is covering the Fantasy Sports Trade Conference XI. They have a nice write up of the legal manuvering going on over fantasy licenses.

As one audience member summed up: If MLBAM winds up in court and loses, they'll get nothing. So they're going to want to take their time.

It's my belief they will lose in court, which is why they should make it real easy and cheap to license stats and names.

Baseball Musings is holding a pledge drive during March. Click here for details.

Statsology has a nice roundup of the issues involving licensing statistics from MLBAM. Like Bud Selig on the issue of steroids, there seems to be a conflict in MLB's position now and in the past:

Baldas quotes MLB Advance Media's Jim Gallagher, senior VP of corporate communications: "Player statistics are in the public domain. We've never disputed that," Gallagher said. "But if you're going to use statistics in a game for profit, you need a license from us to do that. We own those statistics when they're used for commercial gain."

But IP lawyer Kent Goss is quoted as citing an interesting 2001 case in which MLB themselves claimed that player names and statistics were (as far as I can interpret) both in the public domain and free for others to profit from, and the California Court of Appeal upheld MLB's right to use the names and stats of historical players. "A group of former players sued MLB for printing their names and stats in game programs, claiming their rights to publicity were violated," Goss said. "But the court held that they were historical facts, part of baseball history, and MLB had a right to use them. Gionfriddo v. Major League Baseball, 94 Cal. App. 4th 400 (2001)."

It's my opinion that MLBAM should have kept the fees low and encouraged more fantasy games. Fantasy games are a growth industry; they create fans for major league baseball, and those fans spend money in the MLB.com store, attend MLB games and watch the advertising during broadcasts that keeps the teams running. They should be encouraging the growth of the industry with low license fees. If a court finds that the MLBAM has no right to license the stats, they'll end up with nothing.

Baseball Musings is holding a pledge drive during March. Click here for details.

Baseball Info Solutions has player projections for 2005 available for download. The cost is $9.95.

It appears that a number of vendors have agreed to the MLBAM package. You can find the list here.

Heath Shaffer sends along this article from Roto Times. To sum up the story the best I can:

MLB Advanced Media (part of MLB.com) has gained exclusive rights from the MLBPA "to fantasy games using Major League Baseball players for the next five years." Fantasy operators figured they could get a sub-license from MLBAM, but the price has been set very high. MLBAM appears to be trying to drive out large competitors and prevent mom and pop operations from ever getting large.

Okay, so run the games without the logos and so forth. MLBAM believes the demand for its sub-licenses is going to be great. Don't buy them, and the price will drop. All you need is the stats.

While no court has ever ruled specifically that sports statistics are public information that cannot be owned by anyone, courts have allowed use of player names and likenesses by the public without compensation to the sports figures or their trade associations and have also ruled that mere data is public information.

In the 1990's, I was one of the principal programmers for STATS, Inc. on the first real-time scoring software. This software prompted a lawsuit by the NBA against STATS and Motorola, who were distributing the information through pagers. Alan Schwarz recounts the result on page 192 of his book, The Numbers Game.

It meant that STATS had won. The Circuit Court confirmed the original decision holding that no copyright laws had been broken, and reversed -- strongly -- the holding that STATS had taken NBA property by broadcasting scores and statistics. The NBA was not a news-gathering service on which STATS was free riding, and therefore did not warrant INS-type protection. And while the video and audio broadcasts of sports events are protected under copyright law, the facts contained in them are not.

Sports statistics are not copyrighted. So I don't really see what's the big deal. So you can't use images and logos without paying through the nose? Don't use them!

And of course, it's not a bright move by MBLAM, either.

Shortly after news of the licensing agreement broke, MLB Advanced Media chief executive Bob Bowman said "Our goal is to increase the number of people who participate in fantasy leagues and the number of games for fantasy players." He added "We also want to listen to licensees as to how they can make this a greater game." Unfortunately, it's very difficult to reconcile those statements with the facts at hand. The companies still on the sidelines represent millions of fantasy players who will, at best, have fewer choices for their gaming needs if these companies decline to offer games in 2005.

So give out inexpensive licenses. Here's the price structure as reported in the article.

If they have fewer than 5,000 customers, they can have a license for $10,000 for the 2005 season. If they have more than 5,000 customers, the price jumps to $500,000.

That's not encouraging growth. The license cost per customer should drop as subscribership increases; that's how you encourage growth. It's obvious that MLBAM is trying to shut down large competitors.

My advice to fantasy operators is do without the logos. Operate your games with stats only. And band together in case someone comes after you about the stats. The case law that exists is on your side.

As an aside, I find this very disappointing. Major League Baseball has a history of being on the wrong side of technology. They did not embrace radio or television because they thought it would keep people out of the ballparks. Instead, both created many more fans for the game, which led to great revenues. When MLB.com came around, I thought the lessons had been learned. MLB appeared to embrace the internet, creating good content, real time information and game broadcasts. But this is a step back to the old days. Fantasy baseball helps build fan interest in the game. And it builds fan interest in all teams and players, not just the local boys of summer. If anything, MLBAM should be giving away the licenses to encourage as many fantasy games as possible! Eventually, they can ask for a percentage of the take. If the growth is high, MLBAM would do just fine.

I'm even more disappointed in the MLBPA. I still believe they are the best union in the world, but they need to understand that the value of their players comes from fans wanting to watch them perform. More people playing fantasy games means more eyeballs to watch them pitch and hit. It would be nice if the MLBPA stepped in and said, "This wasn't what we had in mind when we gave you the exclusive."

The Baseball Widow starts revealing her fantasy team.

SethSpeaks is putting together a fantasy baseball preview. His first installment of AL Central hitters is up.

As a general rule, I don't talk about Fantasy baseball because I no longer play the game. But I know a lot of people do, so here's a site to check out from ESPN. It's called Out of the Box, and has some fun insights, like this one about Cory Lidle's outing:

Cory Lidle's first start of the season was straight out of Seinfeld's Bizzaro episode. A fantasy sleeper the last two seasons, Lidle survives without a lot strikeouts by keeping the ball in the park. While he struck out just 111 in 192 innings last season, Lidle posted a 3.89 ERA in part by allowing just 17 home runs. So what happens in his first start for the Blue Jays. Lidle struck out seven Yankees in six innings but allowed three home runs. Talk about a bad exchange rate.