Bingles, knuckleballs and ‘Beer Barrel Polka’ – hundreds of forgotten works showcase the eclectic world of baseball scholarship

A new database includes more than 850 dissertations and theses, spanning everything from baseball slang and cigarette smoking to postage stamps and ballpark organs.

By: Tom Reinsfelder, Penn State, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: June 9, 2026

Words: 1,282

Last Updated: 1 month, 2 weeks ago

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By Tom Reinsfelder, Penn State

Today’s fans may associate baseball research with cutting edge analytics. But long before data-driven tools like Statcast and FanGraphs, university students were conducting research about baseball.

About three years ago, I came across a 1988 article published by the Society for American Baseball Research. Written by a historian of Cuban baseball named Peter C. Bjarkman, it highlighted several academic dissertations, noting that they “provide a fruitful scholarly …

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