Moneyball Redux
There is a fascinating article on the Credit Suisse First Boston website called The Genesis, Implementation, and Management of New Systems. It was written by Paul DePodesta, the assistant GM of the Oakland Athletics. DePodesta was featured in Michael Lewis' Moneyball as GM Billy Beane's "stats guy".
The article on CSFB outlines the challenges and approaches that Beane and DePodesta faced and used when implementing their new player evaluation system of in the A's organization.
It's absolutely fascinating and brilliantly written, and like Moneyball, the ideas contained within about innovation, organizational inertia, and exploiting market inefficiences can be (and are) applied to many domains other than baseball.
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Do I know you? My name's Erik and I also work at E5PN. Email me at the address provided, please. I'm all curious.
Good article, but I badly want to ask this guy how many playoff rounds the A's have won during his tenure. And how many times they've beaten the Yankees in the postseason.
In Moneyball, Lewis talks about how the baseball season is like being the house in a casino: over time, the advantage that the house (or A's baseball team) has over the gamblers (or other teams) will result in the house winning in the long run. The playoffs, of course, are limited to 7 games, so luck plays more of a factor--just like the gambler who goes on a wild winning streak for a night.
Does anybody have any contact information for Paul DePodesta or Frank McCourt of the Dodgers ? Any information would be appreciated. You can email any responses to taylorsdad6398@yahoo.com.
Thanks