Plus Sporting News had minor league stats, so you could track the progress of guys you would see in a few years.
The Sporting News for current stats. The gigantic Baseball Encyclopedia for the stats of everyone who ever played in the majors. Plus we relied on baseball cards for stats. Now everything is available on line in real time for free. And many of the stats that we followed are no longer held in esteem and have been replaced and supplemented by all kinds of new metrics. Does all this make the game more enjoyable? I’m not so sure.