Chapter 5: The Jeremy Brown Blue Plate Special
Beane had read all of James' Abstracts before becoming GM of the A's. Something which was learned
if you challenge the conventional wisdom, you will finds ways to do things much better than they are currently done.
A's performed an internal study headed by Paul DePodesta concluding that college players were far more likely to make the bigs than high school players.
And so Lewis takes us into the war room on draft day, 2002, to show us how the A's drafted so many of their desired players with only $9.5 million overall. It is clear that Beane had a different approach to his draft. What still remains to be seen is how well these players will pan out. Lewis has an ability to build excitement and this chapter had plenty. It looked like Nick Swisher was going to be taken by the Mets, just ahead of the A's because a Scott Boras client was demanding a high price. Lewis provides another piece of data that suggests any team who deals with Boras is misguided. If the owners balked, players would drop that kind of agent and all would be better off. While I would want to maximize the money I received too, how many slots do his players fall because of the agent. That drop costs money as well.
Lewis makes it known that the other GMs in the league laughed at the A's picks. While that is probably true, it would have been nice to have had a little more to substantiate it.
Also blogged on this date . . .
- The Bright Side of Life - 2008
- Mr. Thompson Goes Home - 2008
- Governing With Conviction - 2007
- Relativism, Discussion Boards, and Geocaching - 2007
Tags: Moneyball