Shaiel Ben-Ephraim has been a sportswriter for over two decades and a baseball fan for four. He was the founding editor of Cardlines, and his work has appeared in Al Jazeera and the New York Times, among other places. In his spare time, Shaiel is sobbing into his bourbon when the Mets lose and playing Dungeons and Dragons. In a past life, Dr. Ben-Ephraim was a political science professor, journalist, and diplomat, but baseball is his true passion. Follow Shaiel on <a href="https://x.com/academic_la" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">X</a>.
Shaiel Ben-Ephraim 
Last Updated: September 4th, 2026 by Shaiel Ben-EphraimHall of Fame is about the best players of all time, and that's very different from what matters to fans, which are who are the players that were there for them when they were watching important games. And that's why fans are often very unhappy with who gets selected for the Hall of Fame, and much more often with who doesn't get selected for the Hall of Fame. …
Last Updated: August 28th, 2026 by Shaiel Ben-EphraimThere are a lot of baseball trades that really still sting, but we have to think of it from the perspective of the people at the time. Every one of these looks so obvious now, but they didn't look obvious then; well, most of them didn't anyway. The question that's interesting isn't how they could be so dumb, but what they were trying to solve. Every case here …
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