Moneyball

that would definitely determine who's the best

Oh, baloney. That's not what tournaments do.

yeah I mean the 2007 Giants and 2011 Packers were awesome stories (and the 2009 Cardinals almost were one) that IMO trumped any discussion of "were they really the best team"

(2011 Packers definitely were though, obv)

The point is how much these things matter really seem to change from sport to sport, for example I think every casual NBA fan knows that Jordan has 6 rings, Kobe is one short of him, Bill Russell has the most, Dirk just got his first, and Lebron still has zero. Whereas I don't think casual MLB fans will remember that the Cards won with a terrible team in 2006, or even who won it last year. I would imagine most of them don't even remember that the Yankees LOST in 2001!

Whatever allows the Simpsons to air their Halloween episode earlier than the middle of November, even if that means never seeing an AL Central team ever make the postseason ever again.

Which is why I always find the NBA playoffs so more meaningful and fun to watch. Hell in baseball we tend to deliberately ignore postseason stats as though they don't matter.

i certainly remember that the yanks lost in 2001

I don't know if I'm in the minority or not, but I'm reasonably happy with 162 + 5/7/7. I agree with Morbs re "That's not what tournaments do."

i think the formats in all the big leagues are fine, my only beef is the way the games are spread out due to tv scheduling

I remember quite vividly that the Yankees lost in 2001 because I was thinking "Jesus Christ if the Yankees win the series right after September 11 we will never hear the fucking end of it"

this is just a mind game (as is like 90% of sabremetrics

ay yi yi yi yi yi

Like Casey Stengel before the Senate, I'm not here to speak of any other sports.

Whereas I don't think casual MLB fans will remember that the Cards won with a terrible team in 2006, or even who won it last year.

I don't know if I'm casual or not, but I remember exactly what the Cardinals' regular-season record was in 2006, because it was so astonishingly low for a WS winner.

heres a great parody (maybe a little too realistic even)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpkVJTXJ5xw

liked Kevin Goldstein's comments: "Perfectly entertaining... None of it happened that way! Zero!"

well, half right

I actually liked this, tho obv not as good as the book. Still fun! And it even made me feel a little less sad about Phillies losing their last game of the season

there were two shots in particular during the flick that were such quintessential sorkin shots that they made me wonder if he had more to do with the film than just rewriting some of the dialogue (there wasn't so much patented sorkin dialogue imo). the shot where billy is walking through the the facility, past the medical part, thru the clubhouse, etc, was very sorkinesque

hmmmm, I don't think Philip Seymour Hoffman's Friend would let him direct a sequence for him.

As ESPN's Buster Olney said on Bill Simmons' podcast, this is Epstein's "Billy Beane moment" and all of baseball is watching to see what he'll do.

Pretty much lmao at the phrasing on this... Beane backed out of the Red Sox and Blue Jays jobs after verbally accepting... and let's not forget Theo's little tantrum where he quit baseball alltogether until JHenry begged to get him back.

I am arguing with Tracy Ringolsby on Twitter about the 2004 Dodgers. Someone take my keyboard away please.

BILLY BEANE and PETER BRAND emerge from Billy’s office and walk done the hallway…. PETER’s eyes widen and he ducks into the video room… BILLY keeps walking…. ARTIE H. approaches…

ARTIE H.: Hey, Billy.

BILLY: Artie, hey, what’s up, man?

ARTIE H.: Freaking lost again, y’know, right?

BILLY: Four in row.

ARTIE H.: Right. Hey, did you see my new lineup for tonight’s game?

BILLY: You have a new lineup?

ARTIE H.: Yeah, you wanna see?

BILLY: Sure.

CAMERA FOLLOWS them down the hall to ARTIE H.’s office, they pass the video room where FEINY and JOHN MABRY are sitting together.

FEINY: You know, John, maybe you want to try taking a few pitches.

CAMERA continues with BILLY and ARTIE H. in to ARTIE’s office.

ARTIE H.: All right, are your eyes closed?

BILLY: Yeah, they’re closed. Can I open them?

ARTIE H: Not yet. [Gets out lineup card, holds it up in front of him] Now look.

[CAMERA shows BILLY's face as he looks at the linesup card, then pans to the lineup card with Scott Hatteberg written in at first base.]

BILLY: Cool, when did you do this?

ARTIE H.: Just a few minutes ago. Do you like it?

BILLY: Yeah, I like I–

[ARTIE H. Suddenly grabs BILLY by the shoulders and kisses him on the lips. BILLY is surprised and pulls away.]

BILLY: Artie, wha– what are you, wha–

ARTIE H.: I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Billy. Please. I’m sorry…

BILLY: Why’d you do that, Artie? Why?

ARTIE H.: I’m sorry, I just wanna know if you like me.

BILLY: Of course I do, Artie.

ARTIE H.: Can I kiss you again?

BILLY: Artie, I… I’m not…

ARTIE H.: Please, can I kiss your mouth? Please let me.

BILLY: No.

ARTIE H.: Can I have a contract extension?

BILLY: No. No man, let’s go back to the clubhouse with the guys.

ARTIE H.: I’m really sorry, man. Forget it. I’m sorry, I’m just really, really drunk. I’m wasted. I’ve had so many beers.

BILLY: That’s cool. Wait, you paid for those beers, right?

ARTIE H.: Yeah.

BILLY: It’s okay man, forget about it.

ARTIE H.: But you like the lineup card, right?

BILLY: Yeah man, it’s cool. I’m gonna take a charismatic stroll through the clubhouse, you comin’?

ARTIE H.: Yeah, I’ll be there in a minute, you go ahead.

BILLY: You sure you’re okay? [ARTIE H. nods] Alright, man, I’ll see you later.

[BILLY LEAVES]

ARTIE H.: [Sinking into his office chair] I’m such an idiot. I’m such a freaking idiot. I’m such a freaking idiot.

(from Notgraphs)

wait for it...
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-october-26-2011/parks-and-demonstration---oakland-riot

If you follow a shitload of baseball writers on Twitter, your timeline is currently filled with TLR's thoughts about Moneyball.

Overall, I thought this was okay; very strong for the first half-hour, confusing after that. (I'm not sure, but the introduction of Pitt's daughter Moldy Peaches may have been where it lost focus.) A lot of good performances--thought PSH and all the scouts were especially good. It's been a few years since I read the book, so I don't remember much. Does Scott Hatteberg figure that prominently in the book? The film zeroes in on him as the poster boy for everything Moneyball, without (as I'm sure others have probably pointed out upthread) even mentioning that year's Cy Young or MVP winners. Hatteberg had a good year; not as good as the many thousands of players who had better years but didn't figure prominently in any films, but pretty good. When I get a chance, I'm curious as to what he did during the 20-game win streak--which was an odd thing in which to invest so much protracted drama in, seeing as the A's fell back into a tie for the divisional lead a few days after it ended.

jeez dude, PSH and all the scouts were caricatures that fell short of two dimensions.

Gotta disagree. Thought the scouts in their first round-table meeting with Beane were one of the best things in the film, and even though PSH didn't remind me of Howe visually or temperamentally--I remember Howe as an upbeat presence, and PSH is dour through-and-through--I liked him fine.

Another head-scratcher: in a film about turning the sport inside-out, there's time out for Pitt's very old-fashioned tantrum/speech about losing.

Even though it's not stated outright, the decision to trade Jeremy Giambi is based mostly on his deficiency in one of the ancient intangibles (and partly to make room for Hatteberg, yes): he doesn't care enough about winning. Is this an oversight of the film's, or an argument for its complexity?

Winning and losing is the only way to dramatize sports in mass-audience movies.

(or so the people who make them believe)

I thought the film redeemed itself a bit at the end, in the sportscaster's little sermon after Oakland loses to Minnesota (games are won on the field, not inside a formula, etc.). I'm not endorsing what he says, but I thought it dramatized a basic argument--one that's been going on since James first arrived--well.

Wow, this movie is fucking terrible.

It's just a steady nothing.

Did they shoot it in like one day? It felt like a bottle episode.

all my favorite Italian is in

lol whoops

it's not nearly as terrible as most baseball movies (like that one w/ fucking Madonna that I never saw), I'll give it that much.

i thought it was well done. they took a pretty dull theme and made an entertaining movie if it, without going all hollywood all over it.

making a 20th consecutive win into THE BIG GAME = not going Hollywood?

lol @ that i never saw

i thought it was well done. they took a pretty dull theme and made an entertaining movie if it, without going all hollywood all over it.

― Porto for Pyros (The Cursed Return of the Dastardly Thermo Thinwall), Saturday, January 21, 2012 9:58 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

think this sums up why i hated it! they took a really interesting topic and made it tasteful to the point of lifelessness. it was still very hollywood in its heart, just not so much stylistically. they either should've pushed it to the max re: hollywoodness, or actually given it a treatment that engaged in a non-evasive way with the details of the story (like soderbergh, an actual baseball fan, mightve done) - bennett miller, like i think a lot of hwood, identifies with the 'themes' of moneyball but has no interest in the details, but the details are the best part

As I indicated above, I'm closer to Thinwall on this. I don't think you could make a narrative film that does just justice to the details--or maybe you could make it, but not with a big star, and not something that would get widely distributed. I think they did about as well as they could do on that front. If you wanted to wade into the intricacies of the subject, you'd need a good documentary that would take in the whole story of sabermetrics.

well if they had to make it into a moneymaking brad pitt vehicle, i would've vastly preferred that they schmaltz it up and make a pumped up rousing underdog sports picture a la Warrior - something with a bit of theater to it

movie shoulda just been 2 hours of charts, computer screens, and nerds blowing their load as decimals flew by on screen

WAR Horse: The Rick Reuschel Story.

No explosions or high speed chases :::: not going all Hollywood

"Punch it, Billy, Art Howe's gaining on us!"

A League of Their Own is a million times better than this shit

That movie with Matt LeBlanc and the monkey was roughly on par with it.

I liked this and the monkey movie, but anything dealing with baseball or Matt LeBlanc I'll give a pass to.

I do think it was weird that they made the end of a 20-game winning streak into "the big game" as Morbs said, but I guess in the absence of success in the playoffs that's how they planned to sell it to the masses.

thought this was pretty entertaining fluff. the stuff with the daughter was far and away the worst part of it.

I didn't think the daughter part was that bad, just trying to humanize the guy and show why he didn't join the Red Sox - family more important than $$$ and fixing broken dreams of youth. I'm pretty sentimental though, so I guess they got me.

circa otm. For the most part this felt like a generic baseball movie that threw some of the more concrete aspects of the "Moneyball" events against the "rag tag losers who suck but then win" backdrop.

It was perfect for passing time on a plane ride. Not sure I'd have cared about it if I went to an actual theatre to see it.

It probably didn't help that I watched pretty much every A's game that season. I really struggled with how divorced the movie was from reality. But the movie really failed on its own terms. I never got the impression that the ragtag bunch of guys were partipants in the success of the team, but instead some sort of magic was happening, somewhere offscreen while Beane and Brand are in an office. We didn't see how Bradford, Justice, or Rincon helped the team win, and barely saw what Hatteberg did, let alone what the GOOD players on the team did.