Mr. Moneyball is Not Done With the A’s
Baseball, Books August 22nd. 2008, 11:11am
Fantastic find from a tipster while searching Publisher’s Marketplace:
MONEYBALL author Michael Lewis’s UNDERDOGS, about young players drafted by the Oakland A’s five years ago and how in the intervening years they have fared, to Star Lawrence at Norton, by Al Zuckerman at Writers House (NA).
Moneyball might be the most polarizing baseball book ever written; many love it or hate it, but almost everyone has a strong opinion about it. We’re in the former camp. In less surprising news, Michael Phelps also has a book coming out. It centers around his training regimen, is due out in December, and the swimming champ received a sweet $1 million advance.
29 Responses to “Mr. Moneyball is Not Done With the A’s”
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August 22nd, 2008 at 11:22 am
Michael Phelps also has a book coming out. It centers around his training regimen, is due out in December, and the swimming champ received a sweet $1 million advance.
Working titles: I Use My Retard Strength To Swim Fast
or
No, I Am Not Telly “The Virgin Surgeon” from KIDS
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:23 am
Given the breakdown of how the draft class in Moneyball ended up, it should be a kinda depressing read…
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:23 am
Never heard of it.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:25 am
@AW: Nick Swisher is a pretty successful player in that draft. He’s only one of a few guys though.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:27 am
It will read:
I swim fucking more than 10 miles a fucking day. I wake up at 5AM and jump into an ice cold pool and swim until 8PM. You can eat anything you want you if you do that and you will look like me, you fat fuckers. Fin.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:28 am
Also: Bonderman sucks male genitalia.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:29 am
And at least Joe Blanton has been in the majors for a bit, even if he hasn’t fared that well… that’s better than the rest of them did.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:30 am
Mark Teahen has been pretty good as well.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:31 am
Also, the A’s drafted but did not sign JR Towles and Jonathan Papelbon in that draft.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:36 am
If this new book doesn’t include the failure rates of all other teams that year, then this book will be completely disingenuous.
People who hate this book seem to miss the major point: Beane is on a budget and can’t draft or sign the players he wants. Does anyone think Billy Beane doesn’t want ARod on his team? Or Albert Pujols? If they do, they’re idiots. Big idiots. He can’t afford them and has to find undervalued players that will play for a cheaper rate. He’s like fucking Macgyver, building baseball teams out of tinfoil and chewed bubble gum.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:37 am
@ fetch: Teahan has been OK (granted, I’ve never seen 1 AB, just going on basic stats), but certainly not the Giambi clone they described him as…
JR Towles was a disaster this year for my boys… I’d forgotten about them drafting Papelbon…
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:40 am
Exactly.
I always wonder what would of been had Beane taken the Red Sox GM job. YES, they have won two World Series, but I wonder what he would of done differently and just how good of a team he could build with what would appear to be no budget.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:40 am
@ Hef, agreed, but you just don’t see the same props thrown to the Twins or Marlins it seems, and they’ve been far more successful on similar budgets over the past 5 years.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:40 am
BONER!
/Nick P.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:41 am
August- Teahen didn’t take massive amounts of steroids either. I’m not saying would have been just as good had he taken steroids, but I think that helped build the gap. Plus, as Hef noted above: I’d love to run down the 02 draft and see how everyone else did. Does anyone remember Chris Gruler and Clint Everts?
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:46 am
@August: Is this really about the Marlins and Twins? Or is it you that feels unloved?
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:47 am
Teahen didn’t take massive amounts of steroids either.
But did Teahen apologize? I think not… be a man and own up to what you never did Teahen!
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:49 am
As I recall the only high profile pitcher Beane considered taking was Jeremy Guthrie. That seems like a good evaluation.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:53 am
I’m not bashing Beane or Moneyball; I think most people’s views of him have come back down to Earth in that he’s awesome, but he’s not reinventing the wheel.
Really, I’m just avoiding that damned live-blog of something I can’t watch at work… plus my mother always missed my flute recitals to watch the A’s, and I’ll never forgive them for that.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:55 am
Beane also really liked Grienke but I believe they had the 16th pick in 2002 and KC had like the 5th or 6th pick.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:56 am
While I do agree that the Twins and Marlins have done the same thing with the same budget as Beene, the thing that makes the A’s so different is Beene himself. The guy is much more interesting than any other GM and that is why he gets so much more love.
The other thing that people need to think about is that while the A’s and Twins have similar payrolls, both teams have completely different strategies when evaluating players. The A’s play station to station baseball, while the Twins are always looking for speed and fielding.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:59 am
speak for yourself
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:00 pm
wait you did speak for yourself. I mean, I think he sucks, and only gets hits when they don’t matter.
/watches everytime they are on tv.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:02 pm
There are probably 5 first rounders out of that draft who are better than Swisher, and 3 of them were drafted before him.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:43 pm
My favorite part of that book is when Beane goes on some rant to Lewis about how Eric Chavez’s career trends at that point in his career were directly in line with Barry Bonds’ numbers. Am I the only one who remembers that part? I laughed at that line when the book first came out and I like Chavez.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Barry Bonds was permitted to continue to use steroids, Chavez not allowed.
August 22nd, 2008 at 1:00 pm
The fact that Blanton, Teahen, Swisher, et. al. even made the fucking Bigs is a success.
August 22nd, 2008 at 1:08 pm
@ Nick P. You are exactly right. And what about is love for Youk; the Greek god of walks. Has MLJ performed an extensive survey of teams draft performance for the last 5-10 years? It might be an interesting project.
August 22nd, 2008 at 1:59 pm
@slcbuckeye
The steroids analogy shouldn’t apply. Even before Bonds’ “second career”, Chavez couldn’t carry his jock.