[close] Statistics are to baseball as nails are to carpentry: they define, inform, and hold the game together. When the teams fly south for spring training, fans, eager to sort through and argue over the numbers, flock to the sports shelves for the statistics. The Sports Encyclopedia has what baseball aficionados want. From 1901 through 1997, the reference supplies updated and revised lifetime numbers for every player, plus seasonal summaries of each team's performance. In addition, there are details of every playoff and World Series game ever played, profiles of every no-hitter since 1901, updated stats on RBIs, on-base percentages, and fielding, plus classic baseball legends and intriguing trivia. As salaries and sports politics get murky, it's refreshing to surround yourself with pages and pages of solid, quantitative information. [close]