Jeffery G. Hanna
Historians of baseball often argue over how Major League Baseball should be divided into different eras based on trends in the sport. Hereâs one common list: the Dead Ball Era (1901-19), the Live Ball Era (1920-41), the Integration Era (1942-60), the Expansion Era (1961-76), the Free Agency Era (1977-93), and the Steroid Era (1994-2005).
Where does that leave us in 2021? Welcome to the Statcast Era.
The Statcast Era began in 2015 when MLB installed state-of-the-art tracking technology in every stadium. Using a dozen cameras plus radar equipment, this technology tracks the location and movements of the ball and every player on the field in real time. For those fans who love collecting and arguing over arcane statistics, Statcast is another level entirely. For example, we now know precisely how fast the ball comes off the bat of San Diego Padresâ Fernando Tatis Jr. (113.4 MPH). We can now measure which outfielder gets the fastest jump when chas