Soon 2018 will be just a memory. The answer to the trivia question “What year did Shohei Ohtani make his rookie debut?”.

Before then though, we look back on the 5 most popular articles published on DoubleDay Double Talk. Giuseppe and I (Daryll) have been going hard at this blog for a little over 2 years now. We have celebrated with the city of Chicago as the Cubs won the World Series in 2016, saw several of the best World Series games in 2017 with the Astros winning it all, and the Red Sox dominating all season long and through the World Series in 2018.

Our top visited article of 2018 was Giuseppe’s “Top 7 Rookies to Watch in 2018”. This list proved pretty prophetic with Ohtani and Ronald Acuna Jr leading the list and winning their respective Rookie of the Year Awards despite a late call up to the Braves. Michael Kopech was #3 on the list who made some late season appearances but the White Sox are looking to make additional moves to make him more relevant in the years ahead. Walker Buehler, listed 6th on our list, also pitched great for the Dodgers down the stretch and into the playoffs.

Next up was my article about the Padres signing Eric Hosmer. I also self-servingly related it to my long standing theory about Jayson Werth. I stand by it though and though both Hosmer and the Padres suffered from disappointing 2018 seasons – that move was not necessarily about 2018. With the Padres in talks to sign Corey Kluber and some offense showing signs of life in 2018, not to mention a depleted NL West (unless the Dodgers sign Harper) – they may make more proof of my theory yet…

Third most viewed article of the year was Giuseppe’s recap of our weekend together in Cooperstown, NY for Hall of Fame Induction Weekend 2018! I think Giuseppe summed it all up with this quote:

Baseball is about bringing people together, people from all backgrounds, ethnicities, religions, and beliefs can all come together as one in their fandom of a team or hatred for another. Whether you’re young or old, wide or thin, or tall or short, everyone can be united through baseball. Whether you received a D1 college scholarship as a shortstop or played right field your entire little league career, as a fan, everyone comes together as a part of something greater than themselves.

Giuseppe and I co-authored the next article on the list, our joint NL West preview. Thankfully we both overcame our dislike of the Dodgers to pick them first, even though they took until Game 163 to actually wrestle the title from the Rockies, whom Giuseppe correctly called to finish in second place. However, both of us had higher hopes for the Giants (2nd and 3rd) who look to finally be succumbing to their needs for a full rebuild.

Finally, we teamed up again to write our thoughts about the 2018 Home Run Derby – where we both foolishly bet against Bryce Harper to dazzle the home crowd. I even memorably predicted he would cry the rest of the evening after losing to Freddie in the first round. Needless to say none of those things happened.

It was a fun year of baseball, and we will keep you up to date all winter long as we wait for Harper and Manny Machado to sign their new deals. Both deals will shake up any predictions on the season that we have at all and are also both likely to compete as the highest sports contracts of all time.