Doug Pappas
Doug Pappas was a nationally-recognized authority on the business of baseball, and the chairman of SABR’s Business of Baseball Committee since its inception in 1994. With over fifty published articles on the subject, Doug joined SABR in 1983 and served as the Society’s pro bono legal counsel and as parliamentarian at many Annual Business Meetings. He also chaired the committee whose work produced the current SABR by-laws.
Among his many research interests was ejections, and he compiled and updated a database of ejections. His research presentation on the subject, "111 Years of Baseball Ejections" won the USA Today Baseball Weekly Award for best research presentation at the 2000 SABR convention in West Palm Beach, Florida.
He edited “Outside the Lines” the SABR’s Business of Baseball Committee newsletter, and also wrote for Baseball Prospectus. His article, "White Sox Suspended from the American League," was published in The National Pastime #24.
He maintained his own web site and weblog, where many of his baseball writings can be read. At his web site he also wrote of his many road trips and posted photos from the many places he traveled.
Doug was an attorney at Mintz & Gold, where his practice concentrated on general civil and commercial litigation. A graduate of the University of Chicago, Doug graduated magna cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School in 1985, where he was Executive Note Editor of the Law Review.
He started writing about sports at Hackley School in Tarrytown, New York, where he wrote under editor Keith Olbermann, who recalls Doug as "a good kid and a better man, always generous, inquisitive, and creative."
Along with baseball, Pappas had a passion for traveling the nation's roads. He was New York director of the Lincoln Highway Association, and delighted equally in the glories of nature and the tackiness of souvenir stands and roadside stops.
Sadly, Pappas passed away on May 21, 2004, while vacationing at Big Bend National Park in Texas. He was only 42.
