Moneyball is Still Money

In the early 2000s, Michael Lewis wrote Moneyball, an admittedly sycophantic tome about Billy Beane and the front office of the Oakland Athletics.  Lewis wrote about how the Athletics, a historic but struggling club who had very few financial resources to compete with the likes of the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox on an annual basis for pennants, managed to succeed well beyond their payroll.

For those who are not as large of baseball statistical nerds as I am, I'll try to break down the overarching premise of Moneyball--Billy Beane, ironically not a man who fits the standard profile of a nerd (unlike most MLB General Managers, Beane is himself a former baseball player, and interestingly enough not necessarily the type of player that he as a GM would be enamored by), made extensive use of the science of sabermetrics.  Sabermetrics ostensibly refers to the analysis of statistics, but the type of statistical analysis which was used by the Athletics front office was one which emphasized run production.  For instance, while old-fashioned statistical analysis will evaluate basestealing ability based on number of steals, the sabermetric focus recognizes that being caught stealing is more detrimental (since it eliminates run potential and creates a pivotal out) than successfully stealing is positive.  RBIs are also given less weight, since the number is almost entirely contingent on the success of other players.  The focus allowed the Athletics to get maximum bang for their buck in the early 2000s.

Moneyball is the most influential book Michael Lewis ever wrote, and that includes the one that got Sandra Bullock her Oscar.  And now, just as The Blind Side did, Moneyball is being made into a movie.  Now, who is it playing Billy Beane, the man who brought statistical analysis and mathematics to MLB front offices?  Maybe Jesse Eisenberg or Michael Cera?  Naa, too young.  He had a bit of a Seth MacFarlane resemblance in his playing days.  Nope.  Billy Beane is going to be portrayed by Brad Pitt.

Don't believe me?  Watch the trailer.  The movie actually appears to have rather high production values.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiAHlZVgXjk

The thing is, the Athletics haven't been quite the same over the last five years.  And everyone wants to argue that this is an indictment of Billy Beane and his methods.  But if you look at what has actually happened since the release of Moneyball, it becomes abundantly obvious that Billy Beane was too influential for his own good.

First, it's important to remember that focus on "new" statistics was not Billy Beane's idea.  He was just the first jock to truly pay attention to the nerds.  Bill James has been writing about sabermetric principles since the Nixon administration.  In addition, the principles are not that different from what baseball has been used to--sabermetricians generally agree that the best hitter of all-time is Babe Ruth.  And it's not as though you must take a vow of poverty to adhere to sabermetrics.  Just look at Theo Epstein.

The death knell of Billy Beane being revered as the superstar general manager of Major League Baseball came when Theo Epstein, essentially a Beane clone (he even hired Bill James to work in his front office), was hired by the Boston Red Sox.  And the Red Sox won.  For the first time, a major-market team was caring about OPS and runs created and win shares.  And it worked.  All of a sudden, teams were wisening up.  Pretty much every team now utilizes sabermetrics to at least some degree (most agree that traditional scouting should play at least some role in a strong organization).  And then there was Billy Beane.

Now, he's the GM for the Oakland Athletics, who aren't making the playoffs too much.  With that said, they are still doing better than their payroll would indicate.  Allegedly, this shows that maybe he's just a decent GM but not the Svengali he was alleged to be.  But now I'm going to use an analogy.

In the 1960s, The Who were a revolutionary and exciting band--"My Generation" was one of the most raw songs anyone had ever heard and its speed and working class angst were revered.  By 1977, The Who were considered washed up or has-beens compared to the more aggressive, more loud, and more angst-riddled punk movement, with the Sex Pistols and Clash leading the way.  But the fact of the matter is, if it hadn't been for Keith Moon's lunacy or Pete Townshend's songwriting manifestation, punk would never have existed.  Yet in 1977, the members of The Who were in their mid-thirties and were no longer capable of evoking youthful exuberance.  The world caught up.  The Who were still a good band but they were no longer unique.

Of course, in 2011 most people realize that The Who were a vital and great band.  So maybe eventually people are going to give Billy Beane the recognition that he deserves.