\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been mentioning for a few weeks now that a new design was on the horizon and, after several months of planning, I’m delighted to finally launch the new-look BaseballGB.<\/p>\n
BGB started as a one-man blog and has gradually developed into a site with several writers that combines what you might call traditional blog-posts with news stories, full-length articles and regular columns.\u00c2\u00a0 That transition has been great news for me because that is exactly what I hoped would happen when I began blogging on my own back in early 2006; however, the\u00c2\u00a0evolution of the site\u00c2\u00a0has meant that the previous design was no longer ideal.<\/p>\n
Why change?<\/strong><\/p>\n From an aesthetic point of view, I wanted a more eye-pleasing design with a slightly wider area for the article text and the ability to make greater use of images.\u00c2\u00a0 From a functional point of view, I was becoming increasingly aware that, due to the regularity of our posting, good content was very quickly slipping out of obvious view on the main page.\u00c2\u00a0 This was particularly the case with our regular columns.\u00c2\u00a0 I wanted to have the ability to set a clear ‘headline’ story and to highlight the latest instalments of our regular features, whilst also giving enough space to the other articles we publish and offering lots of different ways in which to search our ever-expanding archive.<\/p>\n The new design allows us to do just that.<\/p>\n What it means for you<\/strong><\/p>\n ‘New’ means ‘different’, so the way in which you will navigate around the site has changed a little.\u00c2\u00a0 Obviously the main difference is that a larger selection of content is now available from the main page.\u00c2\u00a0 It is no longer just a simple list of the latest posts in date order.\u00c2\u00a0 A headline story will be set manually so that the most recent substantial article is listed at the top of the page.\u00c2\u00a0 For example: if we write a piece about some interesting British baseball news and then publish a quick update about a new multimedia feature on MLB.com, the British baseball piece can stay at the top of the pile. The MLB.com piece will be published as the main story underneath the category bar. If the headline story is the same as when you last looked, check below the colourful category bar to see if any posts have been added since then.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Aside from the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcheadline\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 area, we can keep items on the main page in two key ways.\u00c2\u00a0 The first is in the ‘featured’ carousel that will serve as a ‘best of BGB collection’, with the seven most recent additions to the category being put in the carousel.\u00c2\u00a0 The second is via the ‘category spoilers’ that can be found on the right-hand side of every page.\u00c2\u00a0 These will highlight our regular features, such as ‘You are the Scorer’ and ‘Weekly Hit Ground Ball’ and we will change them around, as well as the items listed in the category bar, to suit what is most topical at the time.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n New features<\/strong><\/p>\n You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll notice that we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve added in a new Tag Cloud on the right-hand sidebar through which you will be able to search for posts relating to a wide variety of key words.\u00c2\u00a0 For example: posts about the upcoming Fall Classic will be put in the MLB category and then have tags attached to them for \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWorld Series\u00e2\u20ac\u2122, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcPhiladelphia Phillies\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 etc.\u00c2\u00a0 Click on a tag from the cloud and it will take you to an archive of posts that relate to it.\u00c2\u00a0 Individual posts do not currently show which tags have been attached to them (although you can see which category\/categories they are filed under) as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve always thought that this looks a little untidy, particular if you attach quite a few tags to a post.\u00c2\u00a0 However, the idea of the redesign is to make a better experience for our visitors, so if there is a demand for them to be added then I am certainly open-minded about doing it.<\/p>\n A list of the recent posts and comments are available on the right-hand sidebar alongside a list of categories.\u00c2\u00a0 The full month-by-month archive can be found via the new menu bar as a sub-heading under the ‘About’ page (the latter was written just before the 2009 MLB season began and could now do with being updated, so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get to that over the coming week).\u00c2\u00a0 We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve also created a separate page for our list of links.\u00c2\u00a0 If you know of any other baseball-related sites that fans in the UK would find useful and enjoyable, please let us know.<\/p>\n The footer currently takes you into the the BaseballSoftballUK news feed, the Project Cobb Twitter account and my BaseballGB Twitter account.\u00c2\u00a0 I update the latter on a frequent basis, chatting during MLB games, commenting on the latest baseball news and also discussing upcoming articles and features.<\/p>\n The other important new feature that deserves a mention here is the ‘Contact’ page that also can be found under the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcAbout\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 heading.\u00c2\u00a0 We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been contacted by people via our direct e-mail addresses in the past, but putting your e-mail address on the Internet can lead to a plague of spam filling your Inbox.\u00c2\u00a0 This new form will allow you to get in contact with the writer of your choice directly by filling in the form.<\/p>\n The updating process<\/strong><\/p>\n The new design requires us writers (or this editor) to slightly alter the way we lay out our articles.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s no problem with those that we write from now on; however we have over 1,000 posts in the system dating back to March 2006 and they have been laid out to fit into the previous design(s).\u00c2\u00a0 For example, often when we have used images in the past, we have embedded them into the post by linking to another website (most commonly Joe\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s GBBSA site).\u00c2\u00a0 The consequence of this with the new design is that where posts are listed (under category archives, author archives etc) a box with a cross will appear alongside it to indicate that it cannot display the image as it has to be hosted on our own server.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s not ideal, but we can only fix these things by manually checking and editing every post one-by-one, which would make for a significant amount of work.<\/p>\n I’m also mindful that a) these slight flaws shouldn’t detract too much from the content, and b) the time spent doing all that work would be better spent on writing new articles.<\/p>\n So, I’ve taken a pragmatic approach to this problem.\u00c2\u00a0 The most important thing for me was to make sure that previous posts could still be found easily; therefore I have gone through all of the posts to alter things like categories and tags, which to a certain extent can be done in bulk thanks to WordPress, the underlying blogging system we use.\u00c2\u00a0 I have then taken a targeted approach to update those in the archive that I feel are most likely to be of interest to future visitors.\u00c2\u00a0 This includes posts from the regular features such as ‘Weekly’ Hit Ground Ball, This week in MLB, You are the Scorer, Roundshaw Hop, BaseballGB Fantasy League updates, as well as the book reviews (47 and counting) and other featured articles (Q&As with Great Britain players etc).\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The work built up over a period of time so that a good proportion of posts have been updated in this way. The rest will be left in the current not-quite-perfectly-formatted state, unless I decide to do a bit of website housekeeping every now and then.<\/p>\n What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s next?<\/strong><\/p>\n A website never stays static, at least it shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t.\u00c2\u00a0 No doubt I will be making some minor tweaks to the new design as it beds in over the next couple of weeks and we are always looking at ways in which we can improve things in terms of design, functionality and new features.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Although there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an offseason for the players, that doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t extend to us fans and writers.\u00c2\u00a0 The lack of baseball games doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t greatly reduce the amount of MLB news there is to comment on, particularly when it comes to the Hot Stove of player transactions.\u00c2\u00a0 I got into a routine of posting a baseball book review on most Wednesdays over the last offseason and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m planning to do so again this time.\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve already got several books on my list waiting to be reviewed, but please pass on any recommendations for books that haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been covered yet.\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll also be running a series of \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcreview\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 articles looking back at the 2009 season in relation to MLB, the British leagues, the International scene, coverage of the sport available to UK-based fans and much more besides.\u00c2\u00a0 If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got any ideas for articles\/features, or if you want to join in with the writing, please get in contact via the new Contact form.<\/p>\n Of course before all of that we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got the World Series to enjoy.\u00c2\u00a0 It promises to be a cracker, which makes it all the more depressing that it will not be on free-to-air TV in the UK for the first time in over a decade.\u00c2\u00a0 I desperately scoured the TV listings for Wednesday 28 October in the hope that someone somewhere had picked up the rights. All I found was re-runs of films and US dramas.\u00c2\u00a0 Five will be showing a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153live interactive gameshow\u00e2\u20ac\u009d called SuperCasino, which is about as pathetic as it gets.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n So we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll turn to MLB.com or ESPN America to follow the action and use various social networking sites, forums, blogs and websites to keep the British baseball community together in place of Johnny and Josh\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s peerless coverage.\u00c2\u00a0 Hopefully BaseballGB will continue to be one of the main places on the web that does this and that the new design makes it all the more enjoyable.<\/p>\n If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got any queries or comments, please feel free to pass them on via the comments box below.<\/p>\n Cheers<\/p>\n Matt<\/p>\n