Elias Sports Bureau

The Elias Sports Bureau is a company that provides historical research and statistical services in the field of professional sports.

In 1913, Al Munro Elias and his brother Walter established the Al Munro Elias Bureau in New York City. Al was such a huge baseball fan that he began keeping track of statistics in the National League. Through the years, sportswriters began using his information. In 1922, National League president John Heydler hired Elias to aid him in record-keeping. Several years later, Elias Sports Bureau became the full-time baseball statistician for the National League; the American League followed suit later.

Today, ESB is the official statistician of Major League Baseball, as well as the National Football League, the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League, Major League Soccer, and the Arena Football League. More recently, ESB added pro women's basketball (WNBA) and soccer (WUSA) to its list of league clientele.

ESB also is a primary source of statistics for national newspapers, magazines and websites, as well as dozens of broadcasters of MLB, NBA and NHL telecasts.

Steve Hirdt, executive vice-president of the Elias Sports Bureau, has branched out into writing. He started by writing for ESPN.com's Page2 website briefly before moving to ESPN The Magazine to write a column titled "Do the Math" which focuses on statistics.

Elias rankings

At the end of each baseball season, Elias compiles rankings for each player based upon performance over the two most recent seasons. These rankings are used to place players into two tiers of value, Type A (top 30 percent of rankings), Type B (next 20 percent of rankings), or Type C (remaining 50 percent). [http://www.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/al/2007-10-31-elias-rankings-complete_N.htm] The type determines what kind of draft pick a team will receive as compensation if its player signs with another team:
* If a Type A free agent is signed by a different team, the signing team must compensate the player's former team with its first round draft pick in the next rule 4 Amateur Draft. However, if the signing team's first round pick is in the top 15 then they surrender their second round pick instead. Also the players former team receives a "sandwich" pick in between the first and second rounds.
* If a Type B free agent is signed by a different team, the old team receives a "sandwich" pick in between the first and second rounds and the signing team loses no draft pick. [http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/extras/extra_bases/2007/11/compensation_ta.html]
* If a Type C free agent is signed, no compensatory picks are awarded to the player's former team.

Notes

With "Sporting News" having phased itself out of the record book publishing business during 2007, "The Elias Book of Baseball Records" appears to be the sole hard-copy source of official baseball records. This book is available only through the company website.

In regards to Type A free agents. The surrendering of draft picks becomes more complicated if the signing team signs more than one type A free agent. In this instance the signing team surrenders its highest available pick to the former team with who lost the better free agent based upon its Elias rating. Therefore, suppose a team that has a top 15 pick in the first round signs two type A free agents, Player 1 had a rating of 70 while Player 2 had a rating of 65. The signing team would surrender its second round pick to the former team of the Player 1 and its third round pick to the former team of Player 2.

External links

* [http://www.esb.com/ "ESB" website]