Baseball Toaster was unplugged on February 4, 2009.
I was having a conversation with a friend over the weekend about the future of the newspaper business. He suggested that the print version of The New York Times will not exist in ten years. I don't know enough about the future to know if that is correct, but the way things are going it wouldn't really surprise me. Everything is in flux.
The Times is doing a good job with their baseball blog, Bats (their Diner's Journal blog in the food section is tremendous). Sherman at the Post, Feinsand at the News and O'Brein at Newsday, Murti at the FAN, all have blogs to maintain along with their regular duties. Heck Pride of the Yankees has been around, and doing it well, forever. Blogging is part of the every day news cycle.
The fact that blogs as a medium have been co-opted by the mainstream press is not news. Nor is the fact that best Yankee information available anywhere now comes from a blog. But who would have thunk that the one-stop-shop for behind-the-scenes Yankee news would come from a Westchester paper and not one of Big Three? Pete Abraham will be scooped-up one day and be handsomely rewarded for his hard work. In the meantime, if his blog was the only access you had to the Yankees, you'd be well-informed. Pete's site isn't the end-all--other blogs, including this one and a host of others around the 'net, have lots to add to the conversation--but he's the starting point. It's a sign of how things have already changed that the New York Times, Daily News and the Post are all getting their asses kicked by a paper from the 'burbs.
This is good for us as fans because Pete has raised the bar, and now the rest of the papers have to keep up. That's competition at its finest.
Funny, I miss the allure of the sports page - currently they just don't do it for me anymore. I come from a family of newpaper-readers too ... I always used to read 3-4 per day, now just 1 or 2. And I find myself just blowing through them, not spending the time to really read.
Funny too how this entry came up today - as I was driving in to work this am, I was thinking randomly about The National from way back. That was a cool paper I thought....
And thanks to everybody for reading. Nice that there is one forum on the 'net where people are civil.
Still, for the lineup posts, and all the Yankee news updates, I go to Pete Abe first, and often. He's the man.
The title took me back, and I had to share :)
2 I miss The National, they had a few good writers, IIRC. That, Baseball America & Baseball Weekly were in my rotation.
Nowadays, Bronx Banter & WasWatching are enough for me. Sometimes I'll take a journey to other blogs listed on the Toaster, if I see a topic in the sidebar that interests me. Sometimes I'll post in other Yankee-related blogs. Due to time constraints, that doesn't happen often.
Another thing that PeteAbe does well aside from providing inside info (which, more than opinion, is the value of the beat writer) is stoke the flames. Even though I disagree with a lot of his opinions, he is very good at keeping his finger on the pulse and opining on hot button topics among more hardcore fans (e.g., the Josh Phelps and Stinky debate).
Precisely why I don't read him (plus the comments there are effectively worthless). If there was a just-news/zero-opinion version I would probably read it.
I find Replacement Level and this blog plus some of the NYT coverage to be enough. I miss Olney's writing though.
My daily stops are the Banter, RLYW, River Ave. Blues, Pinstriped Bible/Blog, and NoMaas. One of those is not like the other, but hey, a picture is sometimes worth a thousand words (particularly if it is a badly animated one of Curt Shilling-as-Orca seeking a drumstick).
I also go to Baseball musings for more comprehensive around the leagues coverage.
Comment status: comments have been closed. Baseball Toaster is now out of business.