Baseball Cards Come To Life With Augmented Reality

Baseball collector card maker Topps is unveiling a new card using "augmented reality". According to the New York Times "Beginning Monday, collectors who hold a special Topps 3D Live baseball card in front of a webcam will see a three-dimensional avatar of the player on the computer screen. Rotate the card, and the figure rotates in full perspective." The baseball card industry has been struggling in the internet age, going from a billion dollar industry to about 200 million is revenues today. These new cards promise to reconnect people with cards by offering an engaging new experience, at least for now. You really should follow the link above and check out the video...

MLB Contemplates Instant Replay

Major League Baseball, the pro league instant replay holdout, is considering joining the likes of the NFL, NBA, and NHL and could enforce video replay as early as August according to the Associated Press. After a month that has seen a number of blown calls by umpires, the league seems serious about instituting instant replay on disputed home run calls. "It's all still premature," MLB spokesman Rich Levin said Friday. "A final decision has not been made." Fact is that the league will require an agreement with it's umpires' union before it can take action. Umpires, however, are adamant that they do not want video replay to be used to review close plays on the bases or ball-and-strike calls. Seems fair.

How to assure that the best team wins

The CBC has an interesting article that, to me, proves that scientists don't know very much about sports! After analyzing and simulating league play, they found "a great degree of randomness of outcomes in games, with at least some chance that a lesser team can win in any given game". I have some experience in coaching, having participated in two national sporting championships. The fact is that teams who look good on paper do not always win, there is randomness in sport, that's what makes sport interesting! I do find this quote about major league baseball interesting however, "Over the past century, the lower-seeded team had an astounding 44 per cent chance of defeating a higher-seeded team", that number seems high but plausible. The researchers say that in order to ensure that the best team wins the respective schedules should contain a number of games equaling the square of the number of teams in the league. That would mean that a major league baseball team would have to play a schedule of 256 games, nearly 100 more than the current schedule! I say the best team should not necessarily win, but rather the team that performs the best when required to. If the best team won all of the time, nobody would be interested in participating or watching!

Batting Robot Video

It's a baseball weekend in the geek household as my youngest son is playing in a tournament. In honor of the West Royalty Royals AA baseball team... here is a neat video that I found on Youtube. While the machine seems to have a decent batting average, it certainly doesn't hit for power! I'm sure our boys could take him! Enjoy.

Major League Law Suit

Major League Baseball (MLB) has had it's day in court to appeal a lower court ruling in favour of Internet based fantasy baseball companies. An earlier ruling by the courts said that the online companies did not have to pay royalties to compensate MLB for the use of players names. While MLB lawyers argue fantasy games exploit players the judges don't seem to be convinced. "MLB is like a public religion. Everyone knows (the players') names and what they look like," said U.S. Judge Morris Arnold. "This is just part of being an American, isn't it?"

The Globe and Mail has the entire story.