Ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction, colloquially known as Tommy John surgery (TJS), is a surgical graft procedure where the ulnar collateral ligament in the medial elbow is replaced with either a tendon from elsewhere in the patient's body, or with one from a deceased donor. The procedure is common among collegiate and professional athletes in several sports, particularly in baseball. The surgery is performed to restore optimal function for repetitive elbow movements or specifically throwing ability, often extending the careers of professional athletes. In many athletes, the surgery is done more than once during their careers.
The Baseball Writers' Association of America (BBWAA) is a professional association for journalists writing about Major League Baseball for daily newspapers, magazines, and qualifying websites. The organization was founded in 1908 and is known for its annual awards and voting on membership in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Sports journalism is a form of writing that reports on matters pertaining to sporting topics and competitions. Sports journalism started in the early 1980s when it was targeted to the social elite and transitioned into an integral part of the news business with newspapers having dedicated sports sections. The increased popularity of sports amongst the middle and lower class led to the more coverage of sports content in publications. The appetite for sports resulted in sports-only media such as Sports Illustrated and ESPN. There are many different forms of sports journalism, ranging from play-by-play and game recaps to analysis and investigative journalism on important developments in the sport. Technology and the internet age has massively changed the sports journalism space as it is struggling with the same problems that the broader category of print journalism is struggling with, mainly not being able to cover costs due to falling subscriptions. New forms of internet blogging and tweeting in the current millennium have pushed the boundaries of sports journalism.
Baseball Prospectus (BP) is an organization that publishes a website, BaseballProspectus.com, devoted to the sabermetric analysis of baseball. BP has a staff of regular columnists and provides advanced statistics as well as player and team performance projections on the site. Since 1996 the BP staff has also published a Baseball Prospectus annual as well as several other books devoted to baseball analysis and history.
Murray Chass is an American baseball blogger. He previously wrote for The New York Times and before that the Associated Press on baseball and sports legal and labor relations. In 2003 the Baseball Writers' Association of America honored him with the J. G. Taylor Spink Award. He took a buyout from the Times, along with Supreme Court writer Linda Greenhouse and dozens of others, in April 2008.
Frank James Jobe was an American orthopedic surgeon and co-founder of the Kerlan-Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic. Jobe pioneered both elbow ligament replacement and major reconstructive shoulder surgery for baseball players.
Alan Schwarz is a Pulitzer Prize-nominated writer and author, formerly at The New York Times, best known for writing more than 100 articles that exposed the National Football League's cover-up of concussions and brought the issue of brain injuries in sports to worldwide attention. His investigative and profile pieces are generally credited with revolutionizing the respect and protocol for concussions in youth and professional athletics. Schwarz's work was profiled in The New Yorker and several films, including the Will Smith movie "Concussion" and the documentaries "Head Games" and PBS Frontline's "League of Denial". The Columbia Journalism Review featured him on the cover of its 2011 Art of Great Reporting issue and wrote of his concussion work, "He put the issue on the agenda of lawmakers, sports leagues, and the media at large — and helped create a new debate about risk and responsibility in sports." The impact of the series was described by Hall of Fame sports writer Murray Chass as "the most remarkable feat in sports journalism history."
Christina Kahrl is one of the co-founders of Baseball Prospectus. She is the former executive editor of the think tank's website, BaseballProspectus.com, the former managing editor for their annual publication, former writer and editor for ESPN.com, and is currently sports editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. She is a member of the Baseball Writers' Association of America.
In 1986, Ron Shandler began publishing the Baseball Forecaster, an annual publication focused on applying sabermetrics to fantasy baseball, and later founded Baseball HQ, a website with the same focus. Shandler has an MBA from Hofstra University.
Keith Law is an American baseball writer for The Athletic. He previously wrote for ESPN.com and ESPN Scouts, Inc from 2006 – 2019. He was formerly a writer for Baseball Prospectus and worked in the front office for the Toronto Blue Jays. He is a member of the Baseball Writers' Association of America.
Matthew J. Berry is an American writer, columnist, fantasy sports analyst, and television personality. Berry started his career by writing for television and film and creating a few pilots and film scripts with his writing partner Eric Abrams. After writing for Rotoworld as a side-job, Berry launched his own fantasy sports websites "TalentedMr.Roto.com" in 2004 and "Rotopass.com". Berry worked for ESPN from 2007 to 2022 as their "Senior Fantasy Sports Analyst".
RotoWire.com is a company based in Madison, Wisconsin, U.S. that specializes in fantasy sports news and fantasy-style games. RotoWire provides fantasy news and information to ESPN.com, Yahoo! Sports, FoxSports.com, NFL.com, CBSSports.com, FanDuel, DraftKings and Sirius XM Radio. RotoWire is the successor to RotoNews.com, which pioneered the concept of real-time fantasy sports information when launched in 1997.
Gary Gillette is a baseball writer, author, and editor. He is co-editor of both the ESPN Baseball Encyclopedia and the ESPN Football Encyclopedia. For both series of books, he partnered with noted statistician Pete Palmer, as well as writers Sean Lahman and Matt Silverman.
FanGraphs.com is a website run by Fangraphs Inc., located in Arlington, Virginia, and created and owned by David Appelman that provides statistics for every player in Major League Baseball history.
Mike Beacom is a professional and college football writer, and the former president and chairman of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association (FSWA).
Sig Mejdal is the assistant general manager for the Baltimore Orioles of Major League Baseball.
Lewis Yocum was an American orthopedic surgeon.
Larry Donnell is a former American football tight end. He played college football for Grambling State. He was signed by the New York Giants as an undrafted free agent in 2012.
Sports analytics are a collection of relevant, historical, statistics that can provide a competitive advantage to a team or individual. Through the collection and analysis of these data, sports analytics inform players, coaches and other staff in order to facilitate decision making both during and prior to sporting events. The term "sports analytics" was popularized in mainstream sports culture following the release of the 2011 film, Moneyball, in which Oakland Athletics General Manager Billy Beane relies heavily on the use of baseball analytics, building upon and extending the established practice of Sabermetrics, to build a competitive team on a minimal budget.
Edward G McFarland is the Wayne H. Lewis Professor of Shoulder Surgery in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He specializes in the treatment of the shoulder.
