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 18th, 2026 by Shaiel Ben-EphraimRight field is without a doubt a crazy position. It has one major challenge: you have a runner on first, there's a hit to right field, and you have to throw to third base. It's the longest throw any outfielder can make, and it's a very, very common situation. That's why right field is the arm position. You can't hide your arm. Every runner in the league will …
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 …
Last Updated: September 9th, 2026 by Shaiel Ben-EphraimThe way you get into Cooperstown has really changed over the years. It used to be you hit certain milestones, and you were in. 300 wins, 3000 hits, 500 homers. Hit the number, get the plaque. But things change. With the steroid era, the numbers suddenly weren't as trustworthy, and then advanced stats made it even more complicated. Now we had different standards for what we measure and …
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