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Mesmerizing interactive map shows front lines of MLB's biggest rivalries

By Mike Bertha

Facebook knows everything there is to know about you. It knows your birthday. It knows when you're in a relationship before you tell anyone. It knows when you're about to break up, even if you haven't figured it out yet. And now it also knows all of the intimate details about your baseball allegiances.

A new interactive map from The New York Times employs data aggregated from Facebook users to pinpoint which zip codes are filled with fans of each Major League Baseball franchise. The result is a mesmerizing way of divvyiing up the nation.

In addition to the interactive map, the fine folks at The Times thought enough to focus on the front lines of baseball's biggest rivlaries, keying in on where Red Sox Nation gives way to pinstripes and highlighting which neighborhoods in Chicago belong to the Cubs or White Sox.

We've created two features to help readers explore the data. First is an interactive map of the United States that allows you to explore not just the most popular team in your neighborhood but also a table of the top teams for any ZIP code in the country.
Second, in the spirit of Mr. Rushin's Munson-Nixon line, we've generated 14 maps detailing baseball's biggest rivalries, highlighting the borders and offering suggested names for those lines.
The maps were created using estimates of team support based on how many Facebook users "liked" each team in a ZIP code. We applied an algorithm to smooth the data and fill in gaps where data was missing.

Do yourself a favor and waste the rest of your work day analyzing the borders between baseball's major territories. Also, remember that everything you share with Facebook is permanent and will float around the Internet for-ev-er.

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