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Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game | 
 enlarge | Manufacturer: Norton
Category: EBooks
List Price: $9.95
Buy New: $7.96
You Save: $1.99 (20%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  369 reviews
Sales Rank: 495
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.3570691
ASIN: B000RH0C8G
Publication Date: March 1, 2004
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
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Amazon.com
Billy Beane, general manager of MLB's Oakland A's and protagonist of Michael Lewis's Moneyball, had a problem: how to win in the Major Leagues with a budget that's smaller than that of nearly every other team. Conventional wisdom long held that big name, highly athletic hitters and young pitchers with rocket arms were the ticket to success. But Beane and his staff, buoyed by massive amounts of carefully interpreted statistical data, believed that wins could be had by more affordable methods such as hitters with high on-base percentage and pitchers who get lots of ground outs. Given this information and a tight budget, Beane defied tradition and his own scouting department to build winning teams of young affordable players and inexpensive castoff veterans. Lewis was in the room with the A's top management as they spent the summer of 2002 adding and subtracting players and he provides outstanding play-by-play. In the June player draft, Beane acquired nearly every prospect he coveted (few of whom were coveted by other teams) and at the July trading deadline he engaged in a tense battle of nerves to acquire a lefty reliever. Besides being one of the most insider accounts ever written about baseball, Moneyball is populated with fascinating characters. We meet Jeremy Brown, an overweight college catcher who most teams project to be a 15th round draft pick (Beane takes him in the first). Sidearm pitcher Chad Bradford is plucked from the White Sox triple-A club to be a key set-up man and catcher Scott Hatteberg is rebuilt as a first baseman. But the most interesting character is Beane himself. A speedy athletic can't-miss prospect who somehow missed, Beane reinvents himself as a front-office guru, relying on players completely unlike, say, Billy Beane. Lewis, one of the top nonfiction writers of his era (Liar's Poker, The New New Thing), offers highly accessible explanations of baseball stats and his roadmap of Beane's economic approach makes Moneyball an appealing reading experience for business people and sports fans alike. --John Moe
Product Description
"Moneyball is a quest for the secret of success in baseball. In a narrative full of characters and brilliant excursions into the unexpected, Michael Lewis follows the low-budget Oakland A's visionary general manager Billy Beane, and the strange brotherhood of amateur baseball theorists. They are all in search of new baseball knowledge -- sights that will give the little guy who is willing to discard old wisdom the edge over big money. "The best book of the year, [Moneyball] already feels like the most influential book on sports ever written. If you're a baseball fan, Moneyball is a must." -- People"
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| Customer Reviews: Read 364 more reviews...
 Sabermetrics for the masses... July 19, 2008
The beauty of Moneyball is Michael Lewis' ability to communicate an excellent baseball story that satisfies hard-nosed Sabermetricians, but do in a way that doesn't alienate non-numbers oriented baseball fans. The story of how Billy Beane got to where he is today (as GM of the Oakland As) is quite compelling, and clearly of key importance to the main question Lewis sets out to answer -- how the Oakland As manage to be successful despite their (relative) lack of salary. The politics of Sabermetrics aside, this is a terrific read and a book all baseball enthusiasts should read at least once (if not once a season).
An Entirely New Way To Think About Baseball July 17, 2008
For many years, I walked by this book on the shelf of my local library and gave it no notice, as the "Moneyball" title gave me the false impression that it was all about economics. I should have heeded the book-readers creed: Never judge a book by its cover. From the very first chapter, I was hooked by the unique philosophy of the text and fascinated by its divergence from traditional baseball maxims. Essentially, Michael Lewis (essentially a conduit for Oakland Athletics General Manager Billy Beane) discusses two subjects:
First, there is the radically different method, started by Bill James, of evaluating players. Instead of the traditional home runs and RBI stats, James (and later Beane) determined that on-base and slugging percentages were the best predictors of successful performance. Instead of looking at factors beyond the batters control (like RBI), one must look at how the batter controls each plate appearance. I could go on and on about the theories developed in this book, but suffice it to say that they are (or at least were in 2001) a complete digression from traditional baseball wisdom, thus are generally scoffed at by "real" baseball people.
The second portion of the books discusses how Billy Beane uses those new scouting methods to keep his small-market A's viable in the baseball market. Though fans moaned when Beane traded away such stars as Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder, Barry Zito, and Jason Giambi, Beane contends in this book that those trades were necessary in order to reduce payroll, plus he was able to find comparable (if not better) players through his new "sabermetric" scouting method. Being a fan of the small-market Minnesota Twins, I was most fascinated with this portion of the book, trying to determine if the Twins were following a Beane model of business.
Overall, I have absolutely no answers (being neither a baseball insider nor a statistician) as to whether or not James and Beane's theories have merit. However, they do make a very convincing argument filled with valid examples to prove their points. Plus, no baseball fan can argue with the results, as the small-market A's always seem to be in contention.
If you are a die-hard baseball lifer like myself, this is a must-read book. Even if you scoff at every single idea (though I don't think you will) it is worth being exposed to.
Great Introduction to Statistical Analysis in Baseball July 3, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Michael Lewis' Moneyball, is a great introduction to the increasing role statistics play creating a winning baseball team. Lewis profiles the A's owner, Billy Beane, and shows how Beane has managed to create a winning team despite a small budget. It begins to put to rest the use of worthless stats, such as RBI, which is really only a measure of how good the batters are in front of you.
As a former baseball coach, I was interested in the chapter on how Beane selects players from the amateur draft. He creates a strong case for players attending college before entering the draft, especially if one's life long dream is to play for the A's.
If you enjoy Moneyball, I would suggest reading other similar books such as Baseball Between the Numbers, The Fielding Bible, Mind Games, and The Baseball Economist. In general, anything by the Baseball Prospectus people is a great choice.
A must read for all baseball fans June 16, 2008
It's simple: If you are a fan of baseball-meaning you go to more than 2-3 games a year, or watch a lot of games on TV-then you need to read Moneyball.
Moneyball tells the story of how the Oakland A's, with a limited budget, manage to out smart almost every other team in baseball. Basically, in a nutshell-they use science instead of old baseball adages, and apply statistics to better analyze a players ability to get on base and avoid making an out-the key to winning games in the long-run.
Great book, well written. Highly recommended to all baseball fans.
Disliked his Wall Street books, loved this one June 5, 2008
Michael Lewis made his name writing books describing the people behind our financial system -- books that were inevitably described, for some reason, as "funny" or "hilarious." Perhaps these same reviewers were in stitches while reading Javascript technical manuals or the Kyoto Accords. Truly, I saw neither any humor nor any attempts to be funny in these books, which were, sadly, just dull.
How refreshing, then, to have him find a topic better suited to his tone. Yes, money plays a role, but what's described here is the pursuit of excellence, and the courage to flout conventional wisdom in the pursuit of a competitive edge.
A fascinating subject about dedicated professionals. True, these people may come off as a little singleminded, but they have to be (as this book demonstrates) in order to compete against people equally dedicated to finding an edge.
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