Edward Tufte defines Sparklines as intense, simple, word-sized graphics, that should also be high-resolution. They are a very useful technique, especially when combined with the idea of small multiples.
I generated the example below based on the results of the 2011 Major League Soccer regular season. In this case, a whisker-style sparkline was generated for each team to show the complete Win-Loss-Tie sequence for the season. A small upward blue bar shows a win, a grey bar in the middle a tie, and a downward red bar is, of course, a loss.
The graphic succinctly illustrates how each team did over the season. A few interesting tidbits: