1 Year of Climbing the Ladder

Yeah, I've been doing this for a whole year now (not counting the early posts from 2004). One full year of obscure statistics and occasional analysis, with some video comps sprinkled in. Obviously I'm doing something right, because I'm getting 100 hits a day now. Not only that, on September 17, 2005, Sports Illustrated's Grant Wahl named Climbing the Ladder as one of his Best XI American soccer blogs. Eventually, I'd like to make this a real web site with a database of stats and articles to go along with the blog. Hopefully in the next year you'll see that become reality. My inspiration and model for the blog is Baseball Prospectus, which has done so much for that sport. So I'll continue with the formula that I've used so far. We have 19 more weeks of the MLS regular season, and I'll be making a compilation for each one. In addition, I'll be updating my MLS Lineup Database at the end of the year. Plus, there's continuing research like starting lineup stability, pointless obsessions like OTFATT, and whatever other random ideas pop into my head. Who knows, maybe I'll even get a different template (finally!). Oh, and I almost forgot! Year two of the BASAs (Blogosphere American Soccer Awards). It should be a great year. Of course, I can't end the post without a stat, so here you go: Climbing the Ladder - Hits by Month World Cup 2006 preview tomorrow!