So I've been lurking around here for about a year but I've never really felt the need post anything. Now though, I'm looking to buy my dad either a good Sabermetrics book or a stat heavy baseball sim for christmas this year and I was wondering if any of you stat-addicts knew some good ones?

I was thinking of The Book by Tom Tango or Out of the Park Baseball 9. If you guys have any better recomendations I'd appreciate it.

Also, while I'm here...

When you park adjust tRA, is it only adjusted based on pitchers' home stadium and the assumption that half their games will be there, or is it adjusted based on where a pitcher actually pitched his innings?

So (hypothetically) if Carlos Silva, by some statistical fluke, managed to do 120 innings of his suckage in hitter friendly parks and only 33.3 in pitcher friendly parks, would tRA account for that and produce a slightly lower number, or would it in fact produce a slightly higher number becuase of his home park being pitcher friendly?

And while we're on the topic, who do you think would win in a hot dog eating contest, Carlos Silva or a Velociraptor?