Beane Machine Vs. Turner’s Tribe

When you pick up the newspaper, you won’t see the Oakland A’s anywhere near the top of their division, let alone the American League. This leaves many people stunned. How could the “Moneyball” approach not be working this year? Has icon Billy Beane lost the magic, or is there more going on then meets the eye? Obviously Beane’s squad is in the midst of a rebuilding year, but why haven’t the Braves had to have a rebuilding year in over a decade?

Bill Shanks book Scout’s Honor has been proclaimed the “Anti-Moneyball” book. In reading both, there are obviously many differences. Emphasis is placed on stats over appearance for the A’s, and “makeup” over numbers for the Braves. However, the two franchises don’t have as much as contradicting ideas as either side would like to admit. The importance might be placed different, but both teams take the others main points into consideration.

Many times people take a person’s idea and push it to the extreme, then identify them with it. Many people have done this with Billy Beane. Beane made the point that college players are less of a risk to take because they’ve played at a higher level and their stats are then more predictable. This would make sense except many other teams don’t feel this way. Many solid college players are taken before they even get there because teams are willing to take the risk.

Beane has shown in the 2005 draft that he is not as extreme about this belief as many people made him out to be, by taking 4 High School players with his top 7 picks. If you read Moneyball closely, you see that many players are dismissed for reasons outside of their baseball talent or stats. Billy disregarded certain players for reasons like lack of motivation, behavior trouble, and pressure from a girlfriend. The main point of Moneyball was to show how the A’s were able to succeed without the money power of larger franchises. “We’re not selling jeans here” was a famous Billy Beane line with its basic point being: If other teams won’t look at a player because of the player’s appearance, then the A’s will. They have no objection going after a popular prospect (Swisher) because he’s athletic with good numbers, but they also had to find ways to beat the system.

The Braves on the other hand give more authority to their scouts. The scouts have the job of finding talent for a reason, and the Braves have done a very good job in doing this. However, they have had a large payroll for many years, and have the time to let players develop in their farm system for years. College Players are more Pro-ready, but High School players have a better chance to become Superstars. If a team has the money to wait for their franchise to blossom, then good for them.

The Braves have been atop the National League for almost 15 years and nobody can argue with that. In Shanks’ book though, he tries to play it off that the “makeup” of a player is more important than the player’s stats. If the prospect doesn’t have good stats to start with, the Brave’s scouts wouldn’t be looking at him in the first place.

People want to make the franchises polar opposites of each other, mainly for publicity. This year the Braves continue to be in the hunt for a division title and the A’s will no doubt be back atop the AL within a year or two. Both systems have been successful for years, so both of the franchises know what they are doing. Some stars will be found in Paul DePodesta’s magical computer, and some players will reach superstardom the way Dale Murphy did, a franchise that was willing to show patients and have faith in their scout’s abilities.