Where's my two dollars???

Dear Blez,

BG finds it very interesting he's writing a book about that draft class...she was most curious about it. Obviously, we know where Swisher is. How about Jeremy Brown? (He's BG's fav)

Sincerely,
BG

Nicely done Blez. And thanks for the sequel "heads up."

Here is a guy who did an update on the moneyball class just under a year ago.

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/printarticle/the-boys-of-moneyball-again

I don't like the 2nd book being entitled "Underdogs" as I don't feel most the people drafted were really underdogs, as stated in the above link.

Batgirl,

More huge props from ESPN Page2...
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=neel/050420

Isn't Eric Neel a BOD-caliber writer? (in a totally hetero, non-sexual way.)

Great analysis, Blez. If only Morgan and co. would wake up and realize that Moneyball doesn't mean subscribing to rigid small-ball doctrine... Charles De Mar said it best: "Go that way, really fast. If something gets in your way, turn."

(Kindly side-note to Eric Neel: When the Twins win the AL West, BatKitties will probably sprout wings and speak and play major league baseball)

kw,
c'mon. I still want to say "west" 90% of the time. anyone over 30 who has followed baseball for most of their lives is the same way. And it goes for football, too: GB, Chi, Det & Min are in the NFC Central (and will be for the rest of my life!).

I noticed that AL West reference, too. I guess Neel is assuming that with enough Batgirl sass, anything's possible.

2A, I went to Bud Selig's Happy Happy Baseball Camp a few years back and had my head "realigned." After a fun-filled weekend of injections, pills and subliminal messages spliced into old Twins-Brewers game tapes, I'll never consider my team a member of the AL West ever again as long as I live. Expensive, but worth it.

It's frustrating that so many STILL misunderstand Moneyball. I suppose baseball is like religion -- people are uncomfortable with having their belief systems challenged. In any event, if you like the piece above, you might also enjoy (shameless plug coming) something I wrote about this last year: http://blog.davidwadler.com/?p=19.

OK, David Wadler, maybe I'm one of those who still misunderstand MoneyBall. Help me out if I am still missing something.

Here's how I do understand it : 1) team has only so much money to spend; 2) team performs statistical analysis to see what tactics/skills pay off in wins over the long run (162 games), and finds out that steals, bunts and fielding aren't that big a deal over the long run; 3) team finds players that excel in the more valuable statistical skills (over the long run) but for which the team doesn't have to overpay for less valuable skills (like speed, bunting, fielding, etc.). This differs from the Old Way which tends to value baseball skills more abstractly, without regard to statistical significance over the long run. Do I get it?

And the team indeed does well, over the long run of 162 games, as compared to Old Way teams. And the team stays within the budget. Fair enough.

But it appears that in the playoffs, when the opponents are the better teams in the league, the long run analysis doesn't pay off. Closers are really valuable in the playoffs, to make sure you win close games. Scrapping for a run here and there is really valuable in games against the better pitchers, when runs are scarce. Errors in the field are punished when better teams get an extra out.

I think this has been the story of the A's under Beane. Moneyball is a neat concept for competitive regular season teams on a shoestring budget. But the shortcomings of the strategy show up in the fall, and that should not be unexpected. Nor is it unfair to point it out, I don't think.

Maybe this is an argument for a salary cap. That way everyone has to play some sort of Moneyball. But I think we'd miss seeing (and cheering against) the really excellent teams.

P.S. I played hookey yesterday to see Moneyball 2005 play the Rangers (a team that should not be accused of having any management strategy over the last few years). Scoreless into the 7th. But with the bases loaded, E. Chavez plays goalie with a sharply hit double-play ball to him at 3rd. He can make no play, and the eventual winning run scores. Stud closer for the Rangers (Cordero) shuts the door in the 9th. Tex 3, Oak 0.

Error in the field and a stud closer are significant in the game. Oh yes, and the Ranger starter (Astacio) is a free agent signee with warts (only 45 innings over the past 2 years because of rotator cuff) -- an undervalued commodity in Moneyball style.

rodander, you completely misunderstand Moneyball.

Moneyball is not about statistical analysis. You need to read deeper than that. Beane recognized that statistical analysis was not being well utilized by other teams, and that it could identify players able to contribute at the Major league level that were cheaply available. By allocating a small amount of resources to statistics, Beane was able to acquire productive players cheaply. That was the bottom line: cheap, productive players.

The last two seasons, the A's built a team on run prevention. Beane saw that defence was assigned a low value by other teams, so he acquired players like Ellis and Kotsay that, while not being terribly flashy with the bat, play exceptional defence. The A's were one of the best teams at run prevention over the last two years and, despite mediocre offences, compiled an impressive number of wins.

Last year, the A's had one of the best defences in the majors. The error by Chavez in the game you attended was an error by a 3B that has won a string of consecutive Gold Gloves. Here is a great table from the folks at Baseball Prospectus that lists the percentage of balls in play that a team was able to convert into outs (which is the measure of quality of any defence):

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/statistics/def_eff2004.php

You'll notice the A's place 3rd in the AL, and this year they're the top team in the leauge by a good margain

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/statistics/def_eff2005.php

Equating Moneyball to station to station baseball or poor defence is a grievous error. You're far too fixated on what they're doing, and you're completely missing why. It's the why that's important.

As an aside, I would like to point out that the A's have had some of the best closers in baseball during their recent run of success. Isringhausen and Foulke were both closers on A's teams before they went on to the Cards and Sox. They lost playoff series to teams like the Twins and Red Sox that had no established closers at the time.

"But it appears that in the playoffs, when the opponents are the better teams in the league, the long run analysis doesn't pay off. Closers are really valuable in the playoffs, to make sure you win close games. Scrapping for a run here and there is really valuable in games against the better pitchers, when runs are scarce. Errors in the field are punished when better teams get an extra out."

Take a look at the A's-Twins series. It wasn't errors of inability to hit that cost the A's the series. It was Tim Hudson pitching like crap that cost them that series.

It's not like the A's are losing to bad teams in the playoffs. Teams lose in the playoffs. Earl Weaver's Orioles lost in the playoffs. So did Sparky Anderson's Reds. And the A's aren't getting blown out in the playoffs either. They've lost three 5 game series in a row.

Mr Incog, thanks for the note.

The recent moves to better defense by the A's seems to be against the concept of the book, tho. Maybe Beane is a really good GM (and I think he is) and has sine adjusted his approach from that in the book.

About Isringhausen and Foulke, both are indeed now gone. I don't how losing them proves the validity of the concept; all that proves is that they let their closers go. As long as there's a stockpile of quality closers in the system, maybe that works. But I don't think that is a new concept (NYY letting Wetteland go, and having Rivera close, e.g.).

P.S. You take me too seriously about yesterday's game. I know Chavez is pretty decent in the field. Yesterday's play was not an easy one. The scorer took a long time to give him the E5, and it wouldn't have shocked me if it had been a hit.

OK, the last word from me. I GOTTA do some work.

Nick said "It's not like the A's are losing to bad teams in the playoffs. . . .And the A's aren't getting blown out in the playoffs either. They've lost three 5 game series in a row."

Exactly. The A's are not losing to bad teams, they're losing to good teams. And the series are close. That is my point -- close games and close series mean that little things matter.

Barry Switzer was asked how he beat Jimmy Johnson all those years when Jimmy was at Okla State. Barry said, "I had better players than he did." Then he was asked why Jimmy beat him when Jimmy went to Miami. Barry said, "Because he had better players than I did."

My point is that talent tends to win. The Moneyball concept seems to be accepting players that have weaknesses to save money, but choosing those weaknesses that aren't as costly in game results as others. And of course working with those players so that they improve to at least adequate (Hatteberg). But a team built like that is going to be vulnerable, and weaknesses in little things show up in close games against better opponents.

Enough. I've gotta let this go.

Batgirl, can you pleeeze fix the Athletics Nation link in this post? Some evil electronic demon has inserted an extra 'e' and made it AthEleticsNation.com instead of the proper name.

Stupid demons.

The previous post or two addresses the Joe Morgan issue. Playoff baseball vs. Reg season baseball vs reg season baseball and contains the same misconceptions. First of all Beanes ideology doesnt perscribe to any magical winning formula, but rather a formula that they can afford. Its runs per Dollars very simple. I also debate the idea that the playoffs are a small ball scenario. They are a scnarion of playing baseball well, That includes defnse offense pitching and yes small ball. If you can afford all of those fine, if you cant you pick the ones you can, Its thats simple

Moneyball as Beanes concept, does not dicate any long term winning on the field strategy, beacause namely there are many. Teams have one world series with every concievable fashion What it dictates is picking one you can afford and doing it as well as possible, in a systematic fashion. What that is can and will change, The only thing that doesnt change or shouldnt is the idea that you can pick and chose whatever one you like at a moments whim and expect success. Thats how teams spend 100 million and finish in last place.

To me the concept is all about taking a well rounded in depth approach to the game, and finding a way to beat the other guy. after all thats the whole idea

rodander:"My point is that talent tends to win. The Moneyball concept seems to be accepting players that have weaknesses to save money, but choosing those weaknesses that aren't as costly in game results as others. And of course working with those players so that they improve to at least adequate (Hatteberg). But a team built like that is going to be vulnerable, and weaknesses in little things show up in close games against better opponents."

I will point out there is a difference between football and baseball. The main difference being, there is much less variability in a single game. If two good baseball teams play each other 162 times, both teams are going to end up in th 75-85 win range, with the better team above 81 and the worse team below 81. But if two good football teams play 16 times, the better team is going to win 10 of those games.

And that's really the point, the A's are 6-9 in their last three playoff series. Over a 15 game period, it's not at all difficult for a baseball team, regardless of talent, to go 6-9. That's not close to enough games to determine which teams are better. Right now the Yankees are 6-9. and in 4th place. Eventually, I'm willing to be talent takes over and they finish above .500, but 15 games simply isn't enough to determine which teams have more talent.

And again, the A's are winning close games in the playoffs, as well as losing them. Which is normal, because even good teams lose close games.

Rodander wrote "The recent moves to better defense by the A's seems to be against the concept of the book, tho. Maybe Beane is a really good GM (and I think he is) and has sine adjusted his approach from that in the book."

I'm neither an A's nor Twins fan per se, but I believe you're still missing the point of the book. At the time the book was written, and in the past in general, On-Base Percentage was underrated. I think we can all agree on this. So, Mr Beane sees this statistically and stocks up on guys with good On-Base Percentage but without other normal baseball atributes (speed, defensive prowess etc.). Now though, OBP and OPS have become big buzzwords throughout the baseball culture. So, instead of being undervalued, Beane is seeing them (perhaps) as being slightly over-valued. So now he is going elsewhere to get bargains. The Mark Kotsays of the world, who have very strong throwing arms and are good defensive players are now, slightly, undervalued in Mr Beane's opinion (or so goes my theory). So he is stockpiling such guys for cheap. The idea is about getting bang for your buck, not necessarily about getting guys who walk a lot. It just so happened that guys who walked a lot were the guys who were the most cost-effective. Of course, now with other teams (i.e. the Twins, Indians, Padres [even the Red Sox in their own way] etc.) getting smart about their investments in players, it's becoming harder for the A's (or any organization) to find a flaw in the player market to exploit. And in all, honesty, that's what it is all about, taking baseball and being smart with your investments.

I wonder if it's really harder to find a flaw in the market, or if the flaws in the market are simply different than they used to be.

I agree with Mock. Moneyball is about how a team on a limited budget can compete with teams that can spend money freely. Obviously the small market teams have to adjust their way of thinking if they want to compete. A team like the A's then operates a different way so they can compete at a high level, and guys like Joe Morgan ridicule their way of playing. What should they do with their $50 a year budget? Spend it on superstars like Beltran ($11 mil), Tejada ($10 mil) and Hudson/Mulder ($14 mil combined), leaving 15 mil to spend on 21 other roster spots. They'd win 60 games max. I think the A's do a damn good job of putting together a team that can compete, same as the Twinkies. I just don't understand what Joe Morgan and cronies want the A's to do? Just give up? Just play like everyone else does and stink like the brewers and pirates?

Just as a fun fact the total sum of the Twin's starting 2,3,4 hitters salaries (bartlett, mauer, morneau, and heck I'll even add the starting 3b Cuddyer) is almost half as much as the W. Sox pay Pierzinski (.244 with an rbi in 45 ab) is more than two and half times less than each Doug Mientkiewicz (.275 in 51 ab) or Corey Koskie (.232 and 15k in 50 odd ab), and three times less then Cristian Guzman (.145 and 0 run in 55 ab). Not to mention the 14.5 million other teams pay Guardado,Milton,and Hawkins. The twins and other teams like them, cannot afford to keep high priced mediocre players.

Good comments all. But JimRock and Mock say that the premise of Moneyball is to find undervalued players, regardless of the reason for the undervaluing. As the market changes, then the attractive players to the Moneyballing team will have a different set of tools.

But let's assume that all teams start not valuing smallball, so that base stealers, bunters, and good fielders have no added value -- player value is determined solely by OBP etc.

Do either/any of you think that Beane would then convert to a smallball team because the market is then undervaluing those players? That would fly in the face of the statistical long run risk/reward analysis that either IS Moneyball (in my view) or just happened to start Moneyball (in the view of others).

rolander: "Do either/any of you think that Beane would then convert to a smallball team because the market is then undervaluing those players? That would fly in the face of the statistical long run risk/reward analysis that either IS Moneyball (in my view) or just happened to start Moneyball (in the view of others)."

I don't know what Beane would do, but it's a fundamental misunderstanding of risk/reward analysis to suggest that it flies in the face of anything. As time progresses, so must the analysis, and if there came a time when guys that can bunt and steal bases and play defense are undervalued, then it would show up in the analysis. It's not like the numbers stop being counted once a conclusion is drawn.

There aren't alot of major leaguers whose only skill is bunting the ball though. If you can do all three of the things you mentioned you might have value, but honestly, the bunting is pretty secondary to the base stealing (or more accurately base running) and defense. Unless you're talking about the ability to bunt for a hit, and not just sacrafice bunt.

And as others have noted, defense appears to be the place that the A's looked after walks became no longer undervalued.

I read Moneyball about a year ago. Since then I’ve forgotten many of the details of the work but there is one thing that has stayed with me, perhaps even crystallized over time: after a hundred years, the Baseball Establishment still does not understand, at a fundamental level, how its own game works. THAT is what Moneyball is all about.

Billy Beane has exploited this situation for the success of the Oakland A’s, but remember that Beane stood on the shoulders of others, and the book credits all of them, including those such as Paul DePodesta and Theo Epstein who are taking Beane’s model into the future. I did not find Lewis’s portrait of Beane to be fawning, in fact Beane came off as insufferable: bullying, high-handed, chronically unhappy, insecure, one-dimensional…

Those who argue with specific aspects of Beane’s (or others’) philosophies or methods of assessing talent and performance are wasting their time. Nor is it productive to argue that reliance solely on statistics is an unbalanced approach – of course it is. No one (including Beane) claims total understanding; rather, the point is that it has been the outsiders who have, by their objectivity, been able to ask and to answer the question “why,” and launch the game on a wave of self-inquiry and (if you will) intellectual rigor.

Thanks, Nick.

You say "As time progresses, so must the analysis, and if there came a time when guys that can bunt and steal bases and play defense are undervalued, then it would show up in the analysis. It's not like the numbers stop being counted once a conclusion is drawn."

I'll grant you defense, because it is not a tactic.

But bunting and base stealing are different, because they involve game tactics. If bunts and steals are valueless from a long-run game standpoint, then therisk/reward value for these skills in the player marketplace is zero for teams that follow the Moneyball statistical analysis premise. But the game hasn't changed, just the value of these players. In other words, changes in the marketplace will not change the tactical value of these skills in the game.

As I work through this, perhaps there are two concepts at work in the Moneyball approach:

1) There are some game tactics that, over the long run, may not be as valuable as the Old Way thinks (Joe Morgan). So don't pay extra for them.

2) Look for bargain players that are undervalued in the current market because of a flaw, instead of the Old Way of paying top dollar for five-tool guys.

I guess what I've been saying all along is that the long run game tactic analysis (point 1) causes post-season weakness. And I think the data bears that out. Joe Morgan maybe thinks so, too. You build a team with a weakness in an area, and the weakness shows up against better opponents.

Point 2 is of course of some interest. But I don't think it is necessarily new, or invented by Beane (although he gets great credit for making it work).

I also think many of the comments have mixed these 2 things up. I'm talking about game weakness in the postseason, and people tell me that Beane has changed because the market has changed. That's why these comments are all so tangled.

Sartre says "the Baseball Establishment still does not understand, at a fundamental level, how its own game works. THAT is what Moneyball is all about."

I'd say that the baseball establishment (let's say Joe Morgan) understands extremely well how the game, as a game, works. They understand what is required to win a baseball game. Sometimes the situation requires a bunt. Sometimes the situation requires a steal. It is good to catch the ball. Those kind of things.

Moneyball is a breakthrough because it merges game tactics with the business end and player budget.

But when Joe analyzes a particular point in a game, he isn't thinking "A bunt would be good here, but the team saved $X by not having any bunters". He's just thinking about the ballgame in front of him. And a bunt is called for but the player can't/won't do it.