This probably isn't something that I'd normally update a stream with, but I wanted to test-drive my fancy new toys. This is a StoryStream™. It's a way to update a story as it happens. I'm not sure what the best way is to utilize it just yet -- as in what justifies the stream treatment, or what justifies an update. I mean, I know on Baseball Nation. But it's different around here.
So we'll hold hands and figure it out together.
Anywho, when the story broke that Melky Cabrera did not want to win the batting title he was going to win, it seemed like a meaningless gesture. But it wasn't meaningless to people who have to figure this stuff out for a living! From Baseball Reference:
To handle this, we've decided to list ERA Leaders and BA leaders as they currently are in the leaderboard pages. These will be updated and change as new data becomes available and we will be apolitical as much as possible in how we draw these leaderboards. This is essentially the status quo.
In addition, though, we will add as awards the Batting Champion and Pitching Champion which will represent the player recognized at the end of the year as the top hitter and top pitcher. And we will strive to denote on each when the winners of the two do not match up.
Melky screwed poor Sean Forman up. He doesn't deserve that!
The worst part is that once you start thinking about how pointless this debate is, you start thinking about how pointless all stats are, which makes you think about how pointless sports are, which makes you think how pointless your life is. Thanks for that, Melky.