Since this is 1) a website and 2) a website about baseball, it makes sense to consider the rest of the online baseball world. Below is a list of what I believe are The Nine Best Baseball websites going right now. There are more than nine good baseball sites, but these are the best in my book for a variety of reasons.

This list was originally crafted in January of 2013, but it’s been updated several times and you’re reading the version as of March 2017. Please don’t be offended if I didn’t mention a site you really like or work for, I’m not trying to throw shade.

9. MLB Trade Rumors

http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/

This is the site you need to bookmark if you care about transactions. Trades and signings. The staff at MLBTR does a great job synthesizing the news of the day and they do it quickly. I happen to follow a million baseball writers on Twitter and keep tabs on almost everything, but if you don’t have quite that much time, MLB TR does it for you. When roster moves happen, they’re always there for you.

8. MLB.com/Team Website

http://mlb.mlb.com/index.jsp

Not much to explain here except to say that MLB and most teams have done a great job taking their product online with products like Gameday, At-Bat, MLB.TV, the team stores, etc. Having access to video, audio, and box score archives is a huge plus.

7. Cot’s Baseball Contracts

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/compensation/cots/

They’re so great that BP bought them. Every contract for every play erand spreadsheets of team payroll data. Want to know how long a contract is and how much it’s worth in each year? They have that. It’s incredible. A one-stop shop.

6. Baseball Savant

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/

Savant is Daren Willman’s creation and houses all of the public Statcast data, as well as PITCHf/x data previous years. If you’re into that type of thing, it’s an excellent resource to go deep into the weeds. But it’s more than that considering the amount of work Daren has put in over the last year. Graphics, comparisons, catcher data, you name it. Plus, he is willing to add features on request. Hugely vital for the baseball researcher.

5. Baseball Prospectus

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/

There are two hesitations on BP, the firs being that most of their content is behind a paywall. That’s certainly their right, but one should judge a site based on its quality to cost ratio. The other hesitations is user interface. They have lots of statistics, but the quality of presentation trails Baseball-Reference and FanGraphs (even if they do keep some good esoteric ones), and the overall visual appeal of the site is lacking. That said, I’m telling you why they’re 5th instead of 2nd. They have a huge range of content, great set of podcasts, and overall excellent product that mixes MLB, fantasy, and prospect level coverage.

4. Brooks Baseball

http://www.brooksbaseball.net/

Brooks Baseball is a top nine website for its Pitch F/X tool. You can select a date, game, and pitcher and within minutes, be looking at everything he threw that day, where it went, and how much it broke. Those graphics you see on MLB Gameday and MLB At-Bat with all of this data are compiled here and stored in a very accessible way. They’ve also added data on hitters and have dramatically improved the functionality of the site since this list was originally published. If you want to study PITCHf/x data without doing a lot of work yourself, Brooks is the place to do it.

3. Twitter

https://twitter.com/

This may seem like a cop out, and it kind of is, but Twitter is an extraordinarily useful tool for following baseball. Breaking news, live analysis, and other content is at your fingertips no matter where you are and the speed and brevity make a good match. You can follow along on the couch or in the stands if you’re just looking for some commentary, or stay up to date if you aren’t able to follow the game. Plus, it’s a great way to connect with other fans and talk about the game as it happens.

2. Baseball-Reference

http://www.baseball-reference.com/

The amount of information on this site is staggering. Statistics, draft info, random trivia. It’s a clearinghouse for everything you need to know and the exceptionally cool Play Index allows you to go looking for quirky events on top of the regular things you find on any given page. Serious, get the Play Index.

1. Fangraphs

http://www.fangraphs.com/

By far my favorite baseball site. They have a ton of statistical data and sabermetric information, but they also have excellent analysis from a group of very good writers. They do daily live chats and podcasts and are great about giving the people what they want. You can find a section that explains every sabermetric statistic and they do a fantastic job improving the functionality of the site and provide readers with much more user friendly leaderboards than B-Ref. If you want stats, this is the best place to get them. If you want smart analysis, this is also the best place to get it. (Full disclosure: I am employed by FanGraphs, although the site has been ranked #1 on this list since before that. Also, if you think I could financially benefit from this ranking you might not understand how blogging on the internet works).