# Carlos Portocarrero

> A writer who learned to build. Writer, builder, and data journalist based in Royal Oak, MI.

Carlos Portocarrero spent a decade as a journalist (Time Out Chicago, Baseball Prospectus, personal finance blogging)
before pivoting into software and data. He is VP of Data at Crain Communications, where he built
the data function from a single analyst seat. He now builds AI-assisted tools and writes about
investing, technology, and the overlap between craft and engineering.

## Site map

- [Home](https://carlosportocarrero.com/): Hero, selected projects, selected writing
- [About](https://carlosportocarrero.com/about): Full biography — three acts, marginal notes
- [Projects](https://carlosportocarrero.com/projects): Working shelf of built things (5 featured + lab)
- [Writing](https://carlosportocarrero.com/writing): Editorial archive, 2009–2026, chronological
- [Experience](https://carlosportocarrero.com/experience): CV in editorial format — timeline, tools, bylines

## Projects

- **The Oracle** (2026) — AI investment research tool. Ingests 30 years of S&P 500 data, 12 FRED macro series, Shiller CAPE data, and 48 Warren Buffett annual letters into a DuckDB warehouse. Outputs an entry-quality signal for long-term index investors. Stack: Python, DuckDB, scikit-learn, FastAPI, Claude API, Railway.
- **The Dialogue** (2026) — RAG model trained on 640,000 words of Carlos's published writing. Ask it anything and it answers with citations to the original pieces. Stack: Claude, Python, FastAPI, Qdrant, OpenAI, Cohere, Railway.
- **Chess Bot** (2026, Phase 2 in progress) — Raspberry Pi chess companion built with his son. Phase 1: board speaks moves aloud and listens for response. Phase 2: motorized board that physically moves pieces. Stack: Raspberry Pi, Python, Stockfish.
- **Hot Tub Helper** (2026) — Fed it hot tub specs, owner's manual, and every chemical the pool store carries. Enter test strip readings; it returns exact chemical doses. Stack: Lovable, Python.
- **The Designer** (2026, Live) — Website for his wife's interior design business, Mindy Markowitz Design. Built in Lovable, finished in Claude Code. Stack: Lovable, Claude, HTML, CSS.

## Selected writing

- *Perfect Gameplan* — Time Out Chicago, 2012-04-01. How Theo Epstein's front office laid the groundwork for a rebuild that would take a century's curse off the North Side. 14 min read. https://carlosportocarrero.com/writing/perfect-gameplan
- *A Better Personality Test* — Baseball Prospectus, 2016-03-02. How to evaluate the mental side of the game when scouting young prospects — and why the standard tools fail. 10 min read. https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/28562/prospectus-feature-a-better-personality-test/
- *You Never Know* — Personal, 2014-12-30. Everything you do counts and matters, even if it seems insignificant. So just ship it as often as you can and see what happens. 8 min read. https://carlosportocarrero.com/writing/you-never-know
- *The Power of Prototypes* — Personal, 2014-05-05. A design looks great. But a prototype tells you if it actually works. 6 min read. https://carlosportocarrero.com/writing/the-power-of-prototypes
- *Writing 1,000 Words a Day* — Personal, 2014-10-28. A daily writing habit doesn't require inspiration. It requires a number and a deadline. 5 min read. https://carlosportocarrero.com/writing/writing-1000-words-a-day

## RSS feed

https://carlosportocarrero.com/rss.xml

## Contact

- Email: carlos@carlosportocarrero.com
- GitHub: https://github.com/cportocarrero
- Substack: https://substack.com/@cportocarrero
- LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/cportocarrero