[Miskatonic PhD]

Forgive any rambling, please, it's late.

I've been giving this some thought and my lingering impressions of Moneyball and the concept of exploiting, basically, the idea that certain baseball skills are undervalued to build a team, may differ from many of the more statistically-inclined members of the board.

So, I'll begin by explaining what I think is, essentially, a bunch of malarkey, and hold my observations up for comment and critique.

Firstly, an aside. The impression I got from reading the book is that Billy Beane has been accorded way too much credit by the fawning author of the book for coming up with these principles in the first place. Wasn't it Sandy Alderson's baby, which he taught BB, who then ran with them after Alderson left the A's organization? Not really relevant to this discussion I hope to start, but that's always kinda irked me.

On to the meat of my argument. While I certainly believe that seeing something in a player that others overlook is a fine and valuable thing, it can be taken too far. The A's of lore, for example, focused on the under-appreciated OBP-related skills of taking pitches and, by extension, taking walks to the detriment of other usefull skills, like defense and base-running. And it got them to the playoffs for a nice little span, wherein they inevitably fell apart. Some call it a crapshoot. Having watched those games, albeit not recently, it always seemed to me though that what bit those teams in the ass was poor defense and shoddy fundamentals.

In short, sacrificing important elements of a player's skill set to load up on one facet of the game may not be the best way to go about things in the long run.

Now, the A's are a decidedly lower-revenue team, and so they may have to make such sacrifices simply because they can't afford better talent. Which brings us to the Red Sox, a team who can, in theory, afford almost anyone they want.

Is it getting too clever to look for the biggest bargain, when in fact it may not represent the best value for money? That seems counter-intuitive, but allow me to suggest that, while you may be able to buy five Honda Civics for the price of one Corvette ZR1, you're not doing yourself any favors with the former in a drag race.

Again, not to say that value-for-money, or being clever and exploiting an opportunity when it comes up aren't good things, but if you have a certain fiscal robustness, they may not be as useful as one might assume.

Moneyball tended to present "baseball people" as a bunch of dinosaurs with limited mental faculties. While no doubt such men exist, I do suspect that this stance may be a sort of pseudo-intellectual conceit, one adopted by people who are, over-all, no better equipped to handle the "baseball man's" tasks than those dinosaurs are at, say, advanced statistical modeling.

What I'm saying is, there's been a lot of World Series champion teams build before this newspeak came along, and they weren't all run by dummies.

The Sox, since JWH took the keys, have been lauded as a model franchise. Certainly, they've been massively successful both on and off the field. But they don't seem to have gotten there by playing cheap, or settling for one-dimensional, limited players as a rule. Rather the opposite, in fact.

So, I'd like to present a few of what I consider to be significant player moves during this time, with a few observations thrown in. I'm not trying to cherry-pick here, and I'd love to hear what others think on the subject, and their own player examples and observations.


2004 Red Sox trade for Curt Shilling
I don't think there was a whole lot about Curt's game that was "undervalued" at the time. They traded for an Ace, that rarest of baseball commodities. Pretty awesome deal, given Arizona was apparently feeling the pinch financially at the time. But nothing about Shilling fit the moneyball mantra, as far as I can see. A good, old-fashioned blockbuster of a trade.
Returns: World Series champions, 2004. Didn't do it all by himself, of course, but they don't do it without him.

2006 Red Sox trade for Josh f'n Beckett and Mike Lowell
Again, a wealthy team exploiting it's financial edge to land a potential Ace in return for a top-notch prospect and, essentially, money in the form of taking Lowell off their hands. Not much here that hasn't been going on for ages that I can see. Bit Yankees-esque, really. That Lowell turned out to be a nice player for several years was a nice bonus.
Returns: World series champions, 2007. Again, doesn't happen without J f'n B, and Lowell played a nice part too.

2007 Red Sox sign free agent JD Drew
While Drew has certainly been received with mixed emotions in Boston, and on this board, at 14 million/year there's no way he's a bargain. No leveraging insider insight with regards to him either, he's performed, near as I can tell, pretty much along career values. Signing free agents with wide but shallow skill sets to a lot of money, as opposed to finding a guy who does one thing well on the cheap, is definitely not moneyball.
Returns: Definitely contributed to the 2007 championship, and has played excellently, if not always appreciated for it, since coming to Boston. By most metrics pretty much earned his money to-date.

2009 Red Sox trade for Victor Martinez
Again, no hidden bargain here or sabermetrically-inspired steal. Victor was the best catching option on the market at the time.
Returns: Still early, but at least we're seeing less of the corpse of Jason Varitek behind or at the plate. That's something, right?


What I'm seeing here is that, of all the impact moves the Sox have made, none are particularly untraditional. I could see Earl Weaver being quite pleased to add Schilling or Beckett to his rotation.

Of course this list is far from complete, and I may well be wrong. So if so, tell me, and show me where I am.


Edit: Formatting.

This post has been edited by Miskatonic PhD: 09 February 2010 - 04:04 AM

[singaporesoxfan]

Okay, I'll bite.

It seems to me that your statement that "of all the impact moves the Sox have made, none are particularly untraditional" is begging the question, since you seem to be limiting "impact moves" towards traditional big money moves i.e. high-spending signing of free agents or blockbuster trades. In which case, yes, all the impact moves they have made are traditional by default. There were quite a few other moves the Sox made that had a high impact on their recent success. The signing of Ortiz and the drafting of Dustin Pedroia come to mind. Even the signing of Mark Bellhorn made a big difference in 2004. Would these all be considered "traditional moves"? I don't know, but they certainly should be analysed together with the ones that you've already looked at.

I agree that it is too clever to simply look for the biggest bargain. You don't win a trophy for overperforming beyond your value. What you want to do is maximise your wins subject to an income constraint. But I think that's what Moneyball is saying too. I think reducing Moneyball to "playing cheap, or settling for one-dimensional, limited players" and then arguing against that is fighting a straw man. Not to say that one can't find flaws with the book and its central theses.

And choosing Earl Weaver as the anti-Moneyball figure is an odd choice, given that he was venerated for his emphasis on OBP and building teams for the 3-run homer.

[Hatcher Steals Home]

The Sox, since JWH took the keys, have been lauded as a model franchise. Certainly, they've been massively successful both on and off the field. But they don't seem to have gotten there by playing cheap, or settling for one-dimensional, limited players as a rule. Rather the opposite, in fact.

Much of the lauding has to do with exploiting all their resources though: combining scouting, statistical analysis, roster flexibility, financial might, and player development.

You are also forgetting several other signings and trades that were by no means blockbuster deals:

2003: Bill Mueller, David Ortiz, Jeremy Giambi, Kevin Millar - 4 players combined salary of ~$7 million
2004: Mark Bellhorn, Doug Mienkiewicz, Pokey Reese - 3 players combined salary of ~$3 million (counting half of Eye Chart's)
etc

This does not take undervalued pitching into account (in this case, primarily reclamation projects) and also ignores what may be the best example of maximizing an undervalued asset: the farm system.

You state the Red Sox don't win the World Series without Schilling. While I agree, I'd also go as far and claim they don't win it without Leskanic's effort, and certainly not without Bellhorn and Mueller and that non-tendered-by-a-small-market-team DH.

[LondonSox]

Firstly, an aside. The impression I got from reading the book is that Billy Beane has been accorded way too much credit by the fawning author of the book for coming up with these principles in the first place. Wasn't it Sandy Alderson's baby, which he taught BB, who then ran with them after Alderson left the A's organization? Not really relevant to this discussion I hope to start, but that's always kinda irked me.

This "aside" is the key part of the post to me.
Lewis wrote a very good book in Liar's Poker based on hsi own experiences.
Post that he does this, he fidns a champion who he starts with the assumption that smart person is right and tends to write a hero peice about them, ignoring their failing and any logical failings and writes with all kinds of assumptions completely imbedded.

I never fully understood why a lot of real baseball people liked the idea of Moneyball but were very irritated with the Beane fixation and the idea he wass some special guy and no one else could put tow and two together.
More recently he's been writing on topics I know a lot mroe about the inner workings of. Here he does the same thing, finds a guy or girl who has done well, assumes they are really smart and everything they say is true and tells the story from that viewpoint.
It's a perfectly reasonable way to write a book, it's accessable and frankly easier. Also it raises no real arguments for a reader to debate.

It's key to think about this as you read or re-read it.
For example Moneyball tends to outright disparage scouting vs stats. Stats at high school are, at best, dubious. One thing that has made the Sox "a model" is that they use the stats based analysis, including in house developed systems, but ALSO just good scouting as well.
The slam dunks come when the two overlap.

Broadly I think read Liar's Poker which is fantastic (if misguided) and read his other books with a view to questioning the hidden assumptions. Or as entertainment.

[Miskatonic PhD]

It seems to me that your statement that "of all the impact moves the Sox have made, none are particularly untraditional" is begging the question, since you seem to be limiting "impact moves" towards traditional big money moves i.e. high-spending signing of free agents or blockbuster trades. In which case, yes, all the impact moves they have made are traditional by default. There were quite a few other moves the Sox made that had a high impact on their recent success. The signing of Ortiz and the drafting of Dustin Pedroia come to mind. Even the signing of Mark Bellhorn made a big difference in 2004. Would these all be considered "traditional moves"? I don't know, but they certainly should be analysed together with the ones that you've already looked at.

I agree that it is too clever to simply look for the biggest bargain. You don't win a trophy for overperforming beyond your value. What you want to do is maximise your wins subject to an income constraint. But I think that's what Moneyball is saying too. I think reducing Moneyball to "playing cheap, or settling for one-dimensional, limited players" and then arguing against that is fighting a straw man. Not to say that one can't find flaws with the book and its central theses.

And choosing Earl Weaver as the anti-Moneyball figure is an odd choice, given that he was venerated for his emphasis on OBP and building teams for the 3-run homer.

This is the sort of stuff I want to discuss, certainly.

Ortiz was of course a massive home run, but I'm not wholly familiar with the circumstances around/behind his signing (except that the Twins apparently didn't much value him) to use him as an example.

Drafting Pedroia, on the other hand, strikes me as the sort of "traditional" that teams, in getting too cute, and enamored of toolsy players, have gotten away from. Guys who just play well.

I really didn't get much out of Moneyball beyond "find guys with a single above-average skill that no one else values, and get them cheap accordingly." Well, that and ball-washing BB, who seems like a particularly loathsome person to worship.

And yeah, I used Weaver as an example for irony's sake. "Old school" baseball guy who wasn't that dumb, even in hindsight.

Much of the lauding has to do with exploiting all their resources though: combining scouting, statistical analysis, roster flexibility, financial might, and player development.

You are also forgetting several other signings and trades that were by no means blockbuster deals:

2003: Bill Mueller, David Ortiz, Jeremy Giambi, Kevin Millar - 4 players combined salary of ~$7 million
2004: Mark Bellhorn, Doug Mienkiewicz, Pokey Reese - 3 players combined salary of ~$3 million (counting half of Eye Chart's)
etc

This does not take undervalued pitching into account (in this case, primarily reclamation projects) and also ignores what may be the best example of maximizing an undervalued asset: the farm system.

You state the Red Sox don't win the World Series without Schilling. While I agree, I'd also go as far and claim they don't win it without Leskanic's effort, and certainly not without Bellhorn and Mueller and that non-tendered-by-a-small-market-team DH.

I'm sure I'm forgetting more than those, but thanks for adding them! Now, out of that bunch, how many (Ortiz, obviously) were clearly, unquestionably better than could reasonably be expected of them? What I mean is, were these guys clever signings, or just solid citizens?

As for the farm system, I am wholly in agreement with the organization's stated goal of churning out players by leveraging every resource they can down there. I'm just not convinced that this is really "new" thinking. I mean, the Dodgers used to be famous for their central american academies and such a long-ass time ago.

This "aside" is the key part of the post to me.
Lewis wrote a very good book in Liar's Poker based on hsi own experiences.
Post that he does this, he fidns a champion who he starts with the assumption that smart person is right and tends to write a hero peice about them, ignoring their failing and any logical failings and writes with all kinds of assumptions completely imbedded.

I never fully understood why a lot of real baseball people liked the idea of Moneyball but were very irritated with the Beane fixation and the idea he wass some special guy and no one else could put tow and two together.
More recently he's been writing on topics I know a lot mroe about the inner workings of. Here he does the same thing, finds a guy or girl who has done well, assumes they are really smart and everything they say is true and tells the story from that viewpoint.
It's a perfectly reasonable way to write a book, it's accessable and frankly easier. Also it raises no real arguments for a reader to debate.

It's key to think about this as you read or re-read it.
For example Moneyball tends to outright disparage scouting vs stats. Stats at high school are, at best, dubious. One thing that has made the Sox "a model" is that they use the stats based analysis, including in house developed systems, but ALSO just good scouting as well.
The slam dunks come when the two overlap.

Broadly I think read Liar's Poker which is fantastic (if misguided) and read his other books with a view to questioning the hidden assumptions. Or as entertainment.

Haven't read Liar's Poler, so if Lewis used this fawning style as some kind of literary trademark, well, ugh. I know who I won't be reading any more of. And it annoyed me because Beane just comes across as a guy who isn't smart, didn't come up with this revolutionary idea, and is just basically spending all of his time "on camera" in that book acting like a giant douche. Even if he was MENSA material, he'd be hard to root for, to me at least.

And as for your last point, I agree entirely. I just think that the mix, overall, has favored the old far more than the new in terms of producing results at the top end of the spectrum.


I guess part of what I'm saying is, you can sign all the Eyecharts, Muellers, and Millars you like... and you may save some coin and have some really solid players. But by itself it won't be enough, unless you're an Oakland with limited resources hoping to get lucky. But if you want to actually win anything of note, you need the kind of guys not covered by that approach too.

I'm gonna assume that I'm not making much sense at this hour and try again another time, but I wanted to hopefully be clear, I'm not arguing with you guys, or not dismissing your thoughts, at any rate. I want to hear what you have to say.

[AlNipper49]

The Red Sox don't use Moneyball as a bible. Theo said himself here that the best use of quantitative data was in the process of reducing the universe of players to look at, which to him was more valuable at the minor league levels. It's clear they still employ traditional (qualitative) analysis of players at all levels.

[j44thor]

Drafting Pedroia, on the other hand, strikes me as the sort of "traditional" that teams, in getting too cute, and enamored of toolsy players, have gotten away from. Guys who just play well.

I'd argue that there was nothing "traditional" about drafting Pedroia, certainly not in the context of Moneyball. The vast majority of the scouting community saw him as someone too small with too big a swing to be a significant offensive force at the MLB level.

[OCD SS]

Is your argument with Beane, or with Lewis?

If you want to find a place to criticize Lewis in the text, I think you have to look at how little time he spends on the front of Oakland's rotation, beyond pointing out that the Big-3 were cheap. Hudson, Mulder, and Zito were probably a bit more instrumental in Beane's success than Lewis shows.

If you want to go after Beane, I think the chapter on the draft gives you everything you need.

[Arock78]

A lot of people I know think Drew's vastly overpaid, but Moneyball types tend to think the Sox got a pretty good deal. It's because his skills are undervalued by conventional wisdom and perception. The same year Drew signed with the Sox (5/$70), Soriano signed with the Cubs (8/$136). Drew and Soriano are the same age.

Drew OPS+ since 2004 (3 years before and 3 years after he signed)
157
145
126
105
137
133

Soriano OPS+ over the same time span
100
109
135
122
119
84

Drew's actually played in more games since they signed as well.

So if you thought Drew was overpaid, I would hope you also thought Soriano was laughably overpaid. The thing is I don't remember hearing too many people in the media say that Soriano's deal was nearly as ridiculous as I think they should have. All I remember was talk about the Cubs showing their commitment to winning.

This post has been edited by Arock78: 09 February 2010 - 08:07 AM

[Miskatonic PhD]

So if you thought Drew was overpaid, I would hope you also thought Soriano was laughably overpaid. The thing is I don't remember hearing too many people in the media say that Soriano's deal was nearly as ridiculous as I think they should have. All I remember was talk about the Cubs showing their commitment to winning.

Sorry if I wasn't clear, I like the Drew signing and think he's been pretty good value for money. I was pointing out that many do consider him overpaid.

And yeah, Soriano's contract is looking pretty bad.

[djhb20]

I think the way to look at the "lesson" of Moneyball, as it were, is what was posted above. The goal of putting together a winning baseball team is to get as many wins as you can within your budget. This interacts with Moneyball in the following way: on the margin, it's better to spend that money on things that contribute to wins that are undervalued in the market, then on things that contribute to wins that are overvalued in the market.

That doesn't mean that you go around signing $500K/year walk machines or defensive wizards to the exclusion of all else. What it means is that, if you have $5 million to spend on a thirdbaseman (or $14 million on a rightfielder), for example, and there's two guys that are going to require $5 million to sign, you're better off signing the one whose skills are undervalued rather than those that are overvalued, because by nature of that alone, the "undervalued skills" guy is going to contribute more (expected) wins than the "overvalued skills" guy.

The "Moneyball" component of signing JD Drew isn't that he was cheap, but that at $14 million/year (or at any price, really) you're better off signing a guy who does undervalued things, as JD Drew arguably does, than signing the hypothetical $14 million/year slugger, who demands that salary because of a history of RBI, or some other overvalued stat. Now that $14 million traditional slugger didn't necessarily exist the year the Sox signed Drew, but Gary Matthews ($10 million/year) and Alphonso Soriano did ($18 million/year - 8 years) did.

MPhD stated a belief that Drew's earned his money (no need to rehash the argument of whether or not Drew is worth it, there's about 10,000 posts on this board about that already). But if we assume it is, then this is, in fact, a sign of signing an undervalued asset (i.e. Moneyball-style), because history (and economic theory - "the winner's curse") tell us that we shouldn't, as a general matter, expect that free agents earn their money. Because if you've signed him, that means that you placed the most value on him, which suggests that (a) you're smarter than everyone else (or at least have better info) or (b) you overvalued. And (a) usually isn't the case. Another way to look at Moneyball is the desire to be (a) - if you focus, on the margin, on undervalued assets, you're more likely to be putting yourself in the (a) camp, rather than the (b) camp.

Now we can debate about how smart Beane is, or how much he was riding a wave put in place by his predecessors, but that's another discussion.

[Arock78]

Sorry if I wasn't clear, I like the Drew signing and think he's been pretty good value for money. I was pointing out that many do consider him overpaid.

And yeah, Soriano's contract is looking pretty bad.

Yeah, I get that. My point is that I did see Drew as a Moneyball signing. He wasn't gotten on the cheap, of course, but my understanding of the moneyball philosophy is that you find the skills that are undervalued by the market so that you get more marginal wins per dollar than the majority of other teams. That doesn't mean that you have to always pick from the scrap heap. It means that your $140 million payroll goes further than it would if you were using a more traditional approach to building a team.

For instance, Omar Minaya continually demonstrates how to get worse results than the next $150 million team.

Edit: Theo's commitment to player development is a key component of getting the biggest bang for the buck. Given Duquette's philosophy of allowing small market teams to be the Red Sox's farm, this is a huge departure.

This post has been edited by Arock78: 09 February 2010 - 09:13 AM

[Hatcher Steals Home]

I'm sure I'm forgetting more than those, but thanks for adding them! Now, out of that bunch, how many (Ortiz, obviously) were clearly, unquestionably better than could reasonably be expected of them? What I mean is, were these guys clever signings, or just solid citizens?

Mueller was clearly, unquestionably better than could reasonably be expected of him, but your reading of Moneyball is much narrower than mine. I did not come away with "must exceed expectations." I get 'what's the going rate for X, and is that price lower than I value X? If so, X is more valuable to my organization.' As noted eloquently above, it's a great way to fill out a roster. For teams with the finances, this may mean a few complementary pieces, but for low budget teams, it means squeezing as much value out of each position as possible.

To restate what Nip wrote, where the Red Sox come out ahead is the combination of "Moneyball" and traditional scouting.

<edit - I should emphasize you took a smaller scope away from the book than I did - I'm not saying "narrower" is better or worse.>

This post has been edited by Hatcher Steals Home: 09 February 2010 - 09:13 AM

[Joe D Reid]

Mueller was clearly, unquestionably better than could reasonably be expected of him, but your reading of Moneyball is much narrower than mine. I did not come away with "must exceed expectations." I get 'what's the going rate for X, and is that price lower than I value X? If so, X is more valuable to my organization.' As noted eloquently above, it's a great way to fill out a roster. For teams with the finances, this may mean a few complementary pieces, but for low budget teams, it means squeezing as much value out of each position as possible.

To restate what Nip wrote, where the Red Sox come out ahead is the combination of "Moneyball" and traditional scouting.

<edit - I should emphasize you took a smaller scope away from the book than I did - I'm not saying "narrower" is better or worse.>

Yeah, I think the "better than expected" take on Moneyball is a little off. Taken as a whole, the market is pretty good at predicting what sort of performance to expect out of a guy, i.e. what numbers he will put up in certain well-known statistical categories. But one of the ideas in Moneyball is that certain of those statistical categories turn out to be more valuable than others.

The point being that a Moneyball team and a traditional team could each get the numbers they expect out of their signings. It's just that the Moneyball team will be better, because the numbers it looks at are more closely linked with actual winning baseball teams.

[JMDurron]

What I'm seeing here is that, of all the impact moves the Sox have made, none are particularly untraditional. I could see Earl Weaver being quite pleased to add Schilling or Beckett to his rotation.

Of course this list is far from complete, and I may well be wrong. So if so, tell me, and show me where I am.

I would argue that there was one absolutely huge, non-traditional impact move that the Red Sox made in the 2004-2007 timeframe, and that was the trade of Nomar for Cabrera and Eyechart. That was a trade of one generally "overvalued asset" in terms of player reputation and offense in exchange for defensive ability (Eyechart and Cabrera) and the ability to stay on the field (Cabrera). I think we (collectively as a fan base, not necessarily SoSH) tend to look back on that trade in terms of "big name for little names", but it was also a "Moneyball" type acquisition in that it was a trade of two characteristics that were overvalued on the baseball market (offensive ability, and the "name" player) for characteristics that were undervalued on the market (defense, health). That's the only move that I would say was both an "impact move" and a Moneyball-type exploitation of a large gap in the difference between the general market's value and the team's value of certain characteristics of the players involved.

I guess part of what I'm saying is, you can sign all the Eyecharts, Muellers, and Millars you like... and you may save some coin and have some really solid players. But by itself it won't be enough, unless you're an Oakland with limited resources hoping to get lucky. But if you want to actually win anything of note, you need the kind of guys not covered by that approach too.

I agree with your broad statement here. Really, it's something of a Goldilocks situation, I think. You can have teams that try to go entirely for exploiting market inefficiencies all over the roster (A's of the era in question), as well as teams that try to do nothing but buy the assets that are most highly valued on the market (Duquette era Red Sox, Omar Minaya, 2001-2008 Yankees, perhaps?), and not succeed. The key is to mix the two approaches, not in terms of "stats vs scouting", but in terms of going all out for what the market really does value when you need franchise cornerstones (Schilling, Beckett, and you can go back to Manny and Pedro) along with exploiting the differences between market value and team value of a skillset (OBP in 2003-2005, defense in 2009) to fill out much of the rest of the roster. So the approach that does both is "just right", as opposed to trying to go towards one extreme (A's) or another (Mets).

[EpsteinsGorillaSuit]

What I'm seeing here is that, of all the impact moves the Sox have made, none are particularly untraditional. I could see Earl Weaver being quite pleased to add Schilling or Beckett to his rotation.

Of course this list is far from complete, and I may well be wrong. So if so, tell me, and show me where I am.

The trade of Nomar Garciaparra in 2004 was incredibly gutsy and non-traditional.

The Moneyball narrative is simple but intellectually lazy. No close look at any franchise, even the temporary fortunes of the Oakland A's (driven as much by Zito/Hudson/Mulder and steroid-laden Giambi and Tejada as by OBP), stands up to the idea presented there.

The reality for the Red Sox and other large-market teams is that the limits of the 25 and 40-man rosters are every bit as important as the pure payroll. The value of having young, cost-controlled players is that they tend to control them for some of the best years of their careers and because they allow the flexibility to go after really marquee talent when it (occasionally) becomes available. The Red Sox can't "Moneyball" their way out of needing true premium position players and pitchers, but they can use very nuanced scouting and statistical analysis to identify players that might be particularly good fits. These players aren't necessarily the superstars, but you can get a lot of benefit from getting a little more performance out of each complementary piece or role player. In short, you aren't going to see the Moneyball influence in the big signings. You will see them at the margins.

[Scott Cooper]

I think the Sox use "Money Ball" to a point, but are successful because they can go further with the money they have and someone like the A's does not.

The A's were built on a shoestring with above average players that fit the "MoneyBall" mold. This got them to the Postseason consistently in the AL West but never one them a post season series.

My take on that and the difference with the Sox is that you can spend an entire season feasting on other teams 4th and 5 Starters that you don't see in the post season.

Where the sox have the financials to not only use the principals of Moneyball, but also sign the real powerhouse talents that are out there. Especially on the pitching end.

Beckett
Schilling
DiceK

[Alternate34]

First, I don't know how applicable alot of the details in Moneyball are to the current Red Sox for several reasons.

Moneyball was written when players with high OBPs were considered less valuable than now. J.D. Drew's lack of RBIs might downgrade his value a little, but most of the market would value that appropriately. Different skills are undervalued now.

Moneyball was written when scouts were largely part of a groupthink and consider polarized against stats. Stats that FO guys considered were extremely inaccurate as measures of value. Single season wins totals were considered an excellent way to analyze a pitcher. RBIs was one of the 3 big stats. Now, organizations are run assuming that either someone at the top will be rectifying the split or even better, scouts and stats guys can communicate and work together and most FOs know that you can't just look at Ws, RBIs, and fielding percentage.

Finally, Moneyball was written about a team with a tiny payroll and a tiny budget for FO operations. Of course Moneyball would apply differently to the Red Sox who have a large payroll and a large budget for FO operations.

The Red Sox can find the most efficient high priced free agent J.D. Drew. He was expensive, but less expensive than the laughable Alfonso Soriano deal, better value than Carlos Lee etc. He was still a better free agent signing than many other OF. The Sox find the best deals on the luxury player market. The Oakland A's aren't even in the realm of the luxury player market. Just because the Sox are in that market doesn't eliminate concerns of efficient spending. They can't afford to pay Alfonso Soriano, Gary Matthews Jr., Juan Pierre or Carlos Lee big money and make the playoffs consistently. Those were bad contracts at the time they were signed and the Red Sox make more wise decisions on players (Julio Lugo excepted).

The Red Sox can pay the best scouts. They could pay to review those scouts statistically. They could pay pay a bunch of stats guys to find the best measure of offensive value. They could pay the few stats guys who also have a scouting eye who is also a great people person to both stats and scouts and create a proprietary metric of defense that blows the shit out of anything publicly available and is able to tweak it because scouts won't shit on him when he mentions stats and stats guys won't shit on him when he mentions scouts because he is such a great people person. They could then pay an instructional guy to look at a defensive report and see if he could fix that problem that is holding back a guy. The Red Sox can then sink a few mill in a Dominican baseball academy. If it were cost efficient, they could run a Cuban baseball player smuggling ring.

The Red Sox can afford to do the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th most efficient ways of player scouting, acquisition, and coaching. The A's can afford maybe the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. Teams like the Royals use the 39th, 108th and 982nd most efficient ways.

[maufman]

Where the sox have the financials to not only use the principals of Moneyball, but also sign the real powerhouse talents that are out there. Especially on the pitching end.

Beckett
Schilling
DiceK

Someone stated this well: they said the A's find bargains so they can compete; the Red Sox find bargains so they can afford to sign an extra big-name free agent, overpay Jason Varitek, or whatever. I wish I remembered who said that; it's not my idea, and they stated it more elegantly.

I see the Sox' strategy this offseason less as a Moneyball-type attempt to exploit the market's failure to value defense properly, and more as a test of Nate Silver's "secret sauce" hypothesis: i.e., though postseason success has a big luck component due to SSS, teams built with a pitching/defense focus fare measurably better in October than offensive-minded teams-- enough so that a team that believes it can reach the postseason 80% of the time ought to make a conscious effort to build itself around pitching and defense.

Theo has consistently said he wants a team built on pitching and defense. We have seen evidence that he means it in his draft strategy-- the Sox have invested disproportionately in pitching and athletic, up-the-middle position players. Now, as the club contains fewer and fewer traces of the pre-Theo era, we are seeing it starkly at the major-league level.

[judyb]

The '07 Red Sox were built on pitching and defense. Sure, Ortiz was still Ortiz and Manny showed up for the playoffs, but that team was 4th in the majors in runs scored and 1st in runs allowed, and 1st in the AL by a lot. Even Lugo had a good season defensively.