Rick, I cant tell if you're being serious. That is his take on the climate of baseball when the book was written.


The article and the point of the article is that stuff Beane has dismissed as not that important (batting avg, defense, aggressive baserunning) won a world series.


Its literally broken up into sections of Hitting, Baserunning, Defense and pitching. Not one mention of money of value.

Money has nothing to do with it.

That's just not true. The idea that the object of an offense is to score as much as possible and that the object of a pitcher is to limit run scoring is relatively new and based upon the realization that differential correlates to record. Obviously the Royals don't follow such a philosophy and that's the crux of this discussion. Beane is building a team to pile up run differential. The Royals are built to win close games by a run or two.

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Ecclesiastes 5:8

I posted this in the World Series thread. It says pretty much the same thing:

Look, there are some basic "SABRmetric" concepts that are really unassailable. That is to say they are actually just simple mathematics. The concept of a Pythagorean record, for example. Yes, the "when" is important in an individual baseball game. Schwarber dropping a ball in the ninth inning of a tie game in the World Series would be huge. But over the course of a 162 game season, that "when" is rather insignificant. You can plug the numbers (runs scored and runs allowed) into the formula and the vast majority of the time the actual record will be within a game or two of the expected record based upon those runs. There is no arguing with that without looking foolish. So you have to ask yourself- assuming Kyle Schwarber is the hitter most Cub fans believe he is and the hitter he appeared to be in the 2015 postseason- are all those runs he drops in the runs scored column with his batting eye and prodigious power greater than the number of runs saved by some defensive wizard who hits 13 homers in left? To me, the answer is rather obvious.

And that gets us around to the idea of "randomness" and playoff "crapshoots". If you find a team that scores 625 runs and allows 700, that team is going to have 72 or 73 wins or very close to that number. There simply isn't a team that somehow produced such an output over 162 games where the runs fell in a manner so that they won 90 games. It doesn't exist. But in a three game series, it wouldn't be outlandish to believe a team could lose a game 16-0 and win the next two 1-0. Their Pythagorean record would be 0-3 but they would be moving on to the next round. That isn't necessarily evidence of randomness, although it might be. It's probably more accurate to say that in a short series, protecting outs becomes less critical as the "when" is much more important. And this is why a team like the Royals (along with manager Ned Yost!) is "built for the playoffs". They aren't subject to waiting for guys like Schwarber to hit that three run bomb which may not come in the next five games. That guy may have hit two in a Game 6 that never came. From what I can see, that's what makes the Royals a team to be reckoned with in the postseason rather than the hitting abilities of any specific players.

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Ecclesiastes 5:8

Another hard luck season. Maybe next year Billy!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I mean, I know we are all wrong here from time to time with predictions and whatnot. Eaglo even has a meme of being wrong, but its patently amazing to me just how many sports thoughts COF not only gets/got wrong, but is like way way off. Lester is probably going to go down as one of the best free ajent signings in Chicago history. And while I know that at the time of the deal MANY were lamenting the $ Lester was going to get during his final couple of years, it still literally would have been impossible for COF to be further off than he was.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

I don't get the beane hatred, he put together a he'll of a team with the lowest payroll in mlb.

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Yeah, that's the first time the team that started with the lowest payroll has made the playoffs.

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Ecclesiastes 5:8

Somebody tell Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill to clear their schedules!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

My experience with the A's tells me that they have a very good scouting department and that their coaches through their minor league system have been good. I had a couple of my players who were in the A's minor league organization and told me that they were well handled in their minor league careers.

Beane gets a lot of credit, some of it is exaggerated I think but dealing with a small budget is tough and the A's have done very well over-all as far as I am concerned.

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An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

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Fare you well, fare you well
I love you more than words can tell
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
To rock my soul

They will be even better next year and their division will continue to slip.

Id like to see what he could do if they tripled his budget, Epstein had 180 this year, BB had 60 million.. The A's would beat the piss out of the Cubs.

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Mad Dog destroys Billy Beane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1d_L3Pkn-4

Uh, last time I checked the Astros were in the AL West.

Astros cant count on too many more years like they have been getting out of these pitchers.

Without looking it up name 2 pitchers on the A’s staff.

Isn't Billy Beane a gay?

Divorced with a kid. Could be.

There’s two Billy Beane’s. The other really likes playing with the Beanebag.

I think that there is another Billy Beane who is gay.

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An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

Billy Bean: gay
mnemonic device: Bean Burrito

Billy Beane: straight
mnemonic device: e for 'eterosexual

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He had the opportunity to join the Red Sox and be provided on open checkbook. Oakland is just too nice of a city to leave.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Michael Lewis definitely would have if Beane let him.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I'd say that is the best division in all of baseball.

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An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

A common theme.

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Congrats!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

His achievement is almost remarkable, but in the end, KW has more titles and the Twins in the same era probably have as many division titles. They've also blown many games and series. They are 1-15 in elimination playoff games since 2000.

Have the A's even made it to the ALCS under Beane in the last 15 years? I know it in the early 00's they were good and won a division series, but nothing since is that correct?

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