Baseball's top numbers guy tackles true crime

In the beginning, there were bats, balls, and bases. Then along came Bill James, a numbers cruncher who changed the way that baseball fans think about the game. He discovered that sacred statistics like batting averages and RBIs weren't the best ways to measure success and failure.

Now, James is tackling a new topic: true crime. In his newest book, he ponders centuries of blockbuster American crimes in search of greater meaning.
Popular Crime: Reflections on the Celebration of Violence turns out to be a gloriously rambling trip through justice, injustice, and everything in between.

When he's not creating a frame for understanding crime, James – a longtime aficionado of true-crime books – throws in opinions about famous cases. He lets at least one famous would-be murderer off the hook while confirming the guilt of accused killers who still have strong defenders. Most surprisingly, he backs a theory about the Kennedy assassination that sounds astoundingly unlikely but isn't the usual ludicrous conspiracy.

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