Moneyball

That I think, in part... I'm agnostic on whether there are other tangible reasons, but on the surface level, the Oakland teams that failed to advance had different strengths. This year's was more power-heavy (adjusted for environment) than usual.

I'd never read this 3-way interview between Billy Beane + Johnny Ramone.

http://athleticsfarm.com/2012/02/26/when-billy-met-johnny/

CM: Johnny, meet Billy…Billy, meet Johnny…

Billy Beane: Johnny, they might have given you a heads up that I might turn into a crazy fan here and just gush for a few minutes. But I went out and got the “Rocket To Russia” 8-track when I was 16. And I got into the Ramones, the Dead Boys and everybody else for the same reason that you started playing it. I got so sick of hearing “Kashmir,” and “Roundabout” by Yes, and all these synthesizers on the radio. So when I first heard you I went, “Oh my God!” It was like I was enlightened! So I said, “Johnny’s just gonna have to put up with me for a few minutes because I’m gonna turn into like some crazy Trekkie guy here.”

Johnny Ramone: Hey, and I wanted to be a baseball player…I just fell into this!

Kevin Youkilis owns a brewery/coffeehouse near my in-laws and I have never WALKED in there.

Watched this for the first time since it came out and really liked it. (It plays a lot on one cable network here. I'd always stop on the last scene--where Jonah Hill talks about the catcher who's afraid to run to second--and think "I should watch that again." Great scene.)

The biggest problem, as many have pointed out, is how it bends or disregards facts, the timeline, etc. That they don't mention Zito/Mulder/Hudson (and barely mention Chavez; Tejada really only shows up in actual game footage) is too obvious to ignore. If you can look past that, somehow, I think almost everything else is good.

The goopy daughter stuff didn't take up nearly as much time as I remembered (5-10 minutes?). I like all the performances, including Johan Hill (NoTime above thought he was awful). Philip Seymour Hoffman is excellent, although again, supposedly not much like the real Art Howe.

There are some really funny lines. Probably my favourite:

Chad Bradford: "Sir, I just want to let you know I'm going to be praying for you and your family."
Billy Beane: (long pause) "No problem."

I dislike so many baseball films...This might be my favourite non-documentary.

Two-time Cy Young winner, Johan Hill.

Haven't watched this in a while, but I'm sure it still holds up. I didn't mind that so many details were left out, I wasn't expecting a menu of sabermetric terms to show up in a Hollywood dramatization. Distilling the message down to "he gets on base!" and repeating it 100 times was good enough for me.

PSH was great as Art Howe, although as you mentioned, he's not like the real person (supposedly) but that's OK because the character he plays is compelling. I can't say the same for Jonah Hill. De Podesta in the book is a confident, ego-driven hotshot, Jonah Hill in the movie is a bumbling loser who is impossible to take seriously (I know that he's a composite character and not the full embodiment of PdP, the point still stands).

Best scene in the movie is Beane and Ron Washington going to Hatteberg's house. Love how the humour (Wash: it's incredibly hard, the absurdity of showing up without notice during the holidays) and the seriousness are blended together.

That scene has my second favourite line (paraphrase):

Beane: "Playing first is incredibly easy--tell him, Wash."
Washington: "It's incredibly difficult."

It's been so long since I read the book--this was even true the first time I saw it--I have no recollection at all of how anyone was in real life, so I'm probably a little generous there.

So many great lines in this and I’m only about a third of the way in (tbf I did start it this afternoon).

He’d been on the receiving end of the dreams of older men and he knew what they were worth. Over and over the old scouts will say, “The guy has a great body,” or, “This guy may be the best body in the draft.” And every time they do, Billy will say, “We’re not selling jeans here,”

And that face! Beneath an unruly mop of dark brown hair the boy had the sharp features the scouts loved. Some of the scouts still believed they could tell by the structure of a young man’s face not only his character but his future in pro ball. They had a phrase they used: “the Good Face.”

my friend and i still find reasons to use “we’re not selling jeans here” all the time

It’s such a great line! And it’s true as well, baseball is really lookist even to this day.

Now ofc thinking of the bit in the Zito book when he gets picked up for a jeans ad by an ad executive who saw him in an inflight magazine.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/vbgqvm/good-face-high-ass-the-baseball-scouting-glossary

And Billy Beane now attempts to do what he has done so many times in the past: insert himself in the middle of a deal that is none of his business.