Media Reports About the book "Moneyball"

[cubfan33]

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/30/ma...l&position=top

Worth reading, just to hear Denise Morris' replies and J.P.'s quote.

[Wolf Hopper]

How about a quote for those that don't want to sign up for the Times?

[nyy26wc]

Originally posted by Wolf Hopper
How about a quote for those that don't want to sign up for the Times?

Here's the one Will was alluding to--

Waiting for the Cleveland general manager, Mark Shapiro, to call him back, Beane distracts himself by paying attention to several things at once. On his television is ''Lou Dobbs Moneyline.'' On his desk is the most recent issue of Harvard Magazine, containing an article about a Harvard professor of statistics named Carl Morris. The article explains how Morris had used statistical theory to determine the number of runs a team could expect to score in the different states of a baseball game. No outs with no one on base: .537. No outs with a runner on first base: .902. And so on for each of the 24 possible states of a baseball game. ''We knew this three years ago,'' Beane says, ''and Harvard thinks it's original.''

I liked the 5 simple rules--

1) No matter how successful you are, change is always good. There can never be a status quo. When you have no money, you can't afford long-term solutions, only short-term ones. You have to always be upgrading.

2) The day you say, ''I have to do something,'' you're in trouble. Because you are going to make a bad deal. You can always recover from the player you didn't sign. You may never recover from the player you signed at the wrong price.

3) Know exactly what every player in baseball is worth to you. You can put a dollar figure on it.

4) Know exactly who you want and go after him. (Never mind whom they say they want to trade.)

5) Every deal you do will be publicly scrutinized by subjective opinion. If I'm the C.E.O. of I.B.M., I'm not worried that every personnel decision I make is going to wind up on the front page of the business section. Not everyone believes that he knows everything about the personal computer. But everyone who ever picked up a bat thinks he knows baseball. To do this well, you have to ignore the newspapers.

[cubfan33]

Actually my favorite is ...

"His owners have told him only that they won't eat 508 grand; they've said nothing about eating 233 grand. He has two hours to find someone who will take Venafro off his hands. The Mets are a good idea. Beane picks up the phone and dials the number for Steve Phillips, the general manager of the Mets. A secretary answers.

''Denise,'' Beane says, ''Billy Beane, vice president and general manager of the Oakland Athletics. Denise, who is the best-looking G.M. in the game?'' Pause. ''Exactly right, Denise. Is Steve there?'' "

[RichG]

Originally posted by cubfan33
Actually my favorite is ...

''Denise,'' Beane says, ''Billy Beane, vice president and general manager of the Oakland Athletics. Denise, who is the best-looking G.M. in the game?'' Pause. ''Exactly right, Denise. Is Steve there?'' "

I read that paragraph and knowing Phillips' background I thought the response still could have been "Steve Phillips" by the secretary.

While reading the article I kept thinking of the movie "Used Cars" and the ESPN feature a couple of years ago on Manny Ramirez' agent during his free agency negotiations.

It sounds to me as if Beane's also a frustrated manager.

Well written article, though.

[rcartman28]

Looks really intriguing.....

[WiredTiger]

Article was in recent edition of NY Times magazine and was mentioned by Rob Neyer in his chat today.

It was interesting to see how Beane tries to manipulate the system.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/30/ma...l?pagewanted=1

[gyb13]

damn, that's a long article...will read it later tonight...

[TimmyB]

Fascinating.

It leads to the question of -- how long will it take for other teams to catch on? Boston has. Toronto has.

I wonder if Beane will work with the same baseball-intellectual advantage in, say, 10 years from now, or will all the rest of the teams (or, enough of the teams) caught on?

[qtlaw]

Great article; fascinating. I'd say is a don't miss read for this year. The A's way of evaluating players is groundbreaking and will become the "West Coast Offense" of baseball. I am surprised that Beane let the writer see how he jerks the Mets and Giants around on a deal. The NYT Mag is a great place to find stellar writing.

[gyb13]

i guess it's just one of the many stories from the book in which we'll see Beane's salesmanship at work...

[Rajah]

I'm gonna have to order this, and it will be my first order via netshrines connection to amazon (tryin to do my part)

I certainly hope there's some stuff in there about how billy always seems to get his way with allard.

and hey, if he had a huge payroll to work with, would he be the genius that he is? I'm just sayin, he wouldn't have to work so hard to beat everyone else if he had the money to spare.

[nyy26wc]

I'm definitely ordering it. I would have preordered a copy, but the order has to be at least $25 to get Amazon's free shipping so I'll have to add something else to the order. Then, when I find whatever I decide to add, I don't want to have to wait for the whole shipment to be shipped at once.

[Wolf Hopper]

Just starting reading the NYT snip of the book (someone sent it to me in the NYT Mag that it ran) - - very disappointed to read that Billy Beane dips smokeless - - - I thought he was a smart guy?

[gyb13]

"Denise, who is the best-looking GM in the game with no teeth?"