Is Billy Beane Surrounded By Too Many Yes Men?

It seems Intern Bill has lobbed me a softball with this post, in which he examines an article in the Santa Rosa Press. Let’s take this paragraph by paragraph….

On Monday, seemingly eager to rile those in the statistical baseball community, the Santa Rosa Press Democrat’s Lowell Cohn wrote that not only were the Oakland Athletics a better baseball club before their most recent round of trades, but also that Oakland General Manager Billy Beane’s method of team construction wasn’t that great, the A’s will never contend, and that Beane himself is an ego maniacal freakshow surrounded by yes men that make the acolytes that fall at the feet of Steve Jobs look downright insubordinate by comparison.

Hmm, yeah well since this is Cohn’s thoughts I don’t wanna rip on him too much, but no shit the A’s were better before the trades, but they aren’t trying to win this year, they’re trying to win for several years. The best way to do this is trade established players for prospects. Next.

Naturally, the story was met with outrage in the circles where the only method of reproduction will be (and is) online dating. Remember how a few years ago, some guy in Denmark drew a picture of the prophet Mohammed, and Muslims everywhere collectively lost their minds? This is basically the basement-dwelling stat outcast’s equivalent of drawing a picture of the prophet, taking a dump on it, and wiping oneself with the pages of the Koran. After going home Tuesday, Cohn might have found David Eckstien’s head in his bed. However, once a reader gets past the sheer boldness of it all (or arrogance, depending on your perspective), Mr. Cohn makes some points that are worth exploring.

I will bet he does not. Nice mom’s basement joke too, retard. I think Intern Bill must be Murray Chass.

Concerning the on-field product, Cohn is obviously wrong. Billy Beane, the gay seer of Alameda County*, has guided the A’s to the postseason five times in 11 years despite having one of the lowest payrolls in baseball, and he did this by using two different “cores” of players. If you accept Cohn’s central thesis, the A’s might have made the playoffs this year if they didn’t blow up the team again. This is a laudable accomplishment, and should allow for a great deal more leeway when judging Beane’s actions, rather than say Houston GM Ed Wade trading for a broken down Randy Wolf when his team is 10 games out of first place. As for Cohn, anyone who says that imbecilic Brian Sabean is a better GM than Beane should probably not be taken seriously.

I have to commend Intern Bill here. He makes a great point about the Randy Wolf trade, and he’s definitely right in saying that no matter what you think about Beane, if you say Brian Sabean is better than him you’re retarded. The end.

But assuming they’re true, some of the other points resonate. Shouldn’t even very smart and successful people have at least one voice around that goes against their conventional wisdom? A few less yes men for George Lucas and company would have made the most recent Indiana Jones’ abomination an extension of a great franchise instead of the death of it. And doesn’t the fact that Beane is a co-owner of the team and its GM put the franchise in a potentially touchy position? What if this whole “my [ish] doesn’t work in the playoffs” thing (Beane’s quote, not ours) really doesn’t produce the results fans and ownership are seeking? And doesn’t that make it nearly impossible to make a change? When a person has the best job they know they can possibly get, that’s when that same person’s job performance starts to slip. Because when there’s no motivation, what’s the point of trying harder? A World Series title won’t make Billy any richer.

Had Intern Bill read Moneyball, he’d realize the A’s have tons of people who aren’t “yes men.” And no shit Beane’s shit doesn’t work in the playoffs. It makes infinitely more sense to design a team around who will be the best over 162 games rather than over 20ish playoff games. And who says there is no motivation? You don’t think Billy Beane wants a World Series? If you think that, you’re an idiot.

Or will it? Maybe it’s not so much that Beane wants to win, but rather win his way. It’s not enough to have a ticker tape parade while dodging bullets in Oak-town, he needs to show that he’s the smartest guy in the room, and deserves the kind of worship people have been giving him all along. And if that means trading away stars, hemorrhaging fans every year, and moving the team to a parking lot with a mayor, so be it. In the words of Bill James, “the best part about being in an ivory tower is pissing on the people below you.”** If Beane continues on this path, and fails to bring home a title, that’s exactly what he’ll be doing to the fans of the Oakland A’s.

Beane is the smartest guy in the room, that much has pretty much been established. The only person who can really rival him is Theo Epstein, and thet is because he has mounds of cash at his disposal. If they switched places I would be willing to guarantee the Red Sox would have two World Series titles still, and perhaps even more. And yeah I suppose the A’s aren’t gaining a ton of fans, but if they keep getting into the playoffs lik they have been, eventually the stars will align and the A’s will bring home a World Series.

To be honest, this post didn’t have much to argue, because Intern Bill didn’t make any points. It seems to avoid criticism he has backed off his stances a lot, and is now just offering fluff. Which I suppose is better than basically admitting he is a dumbass.

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As you all know, this is designed pretty much to rip on Intern Bill. Obviously I’m not going to reveal who I am, much like he has not. I’ll be critiquing his posts over at TBL usually within 24 hours of when they are posted. I’m skipping the current one, but rest assured I’ll have a critique of the next one up. I’m going to try to refrain from making this seem a little too much like Fire Joe Morgan, but I’ll probably be following the same format so I apologize if it seems like I’m ripping them off too much.
If you have any questions, complaints, etc. feel free to send an e-mail to internbillsucks@gmail.com

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