Moneyball is a somewhat fictionalized story about how Oakland Athletics\u2019 General Manager Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt) brings advanced statistical analysis (sabermetrics) to the management of a major league baseball team.<\/p>\n
When the A\u2019s are beaten in the fifth game of the 2001 ALDS series by the New York Yankees and subsequently the Yankees and Red Sox steal away the two best players on the team (Jason Giami and Johnny Damon) through free-agency and the A\u2019s owner tells Beane that there is no money to replace these stars, Beane searches for a way to overcome the unfair disparity of his team\u2019s poverty.\u00a0 Beane discovers a young statistician in the Cleveland Indians management team; Peter Brand (played by Jonah Hill) who understands sabermetrics and brings him to Oakland to help him compete for the American League championship against teams like the New York Yankees who have three times the salary budget.<\/p>\n
(Spoiler Alert \u2013 Skip down to last paragraph to avoid spoilers and read recommendation)<\/strong><\/p>\n The movie chronicles Beane and Brand battling with the team\u2019s scouting personnel and the A\u2019s manager Art Howe (played by Philip Seymour Hoffman) while being crucified in the press and social media by fans and pundits because of the unorthodox trades and policies that they institute.\u00a0 Everything is based on what statistically will reduce the number of outs and produce more runs and more wins.\u00a0 They forbid players from bunting or stealing bases.\u00a0 The assign a badly injured catcher (Scott Hatteberg portrayed by Chris Pratt) as the team\u2019s first baseman because he has a slightly higher on base percentage than the All-Star first baseman they already have.\u00a0 They hire a pitcher who can only throw in the 80-mph range because his price tag is a bargain.\u00a0 And the first half of the season is a catastrophe. \u00a0But Billy sticks with Brand\u2019s system and before the end of the season the A\u2019s gel as a team and even break the record for longest winning streak in AL history (twenty games).<\/p>\n But of course, statistical success is a long-term concept and in a short series like the playoffs big money still buys baseball heroes who hit lots of home runs in October.\u00a0 And the A\u2019s lose in the playoffs again.\u00a0 But their success with the meager resources provided catches the attention of more well-funded teams and the owner of the Boston Red Sox; John Henry offers Beane an unheard-of salary of $12.5 million to be general manager of his team.\u00a0 Ultimately Beane remains in Oakland for personal reasons (being close to his daughter) but sabermetrics wins over major league baseball and is now the standard method for building a team in baseball.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve read that many of the entertaining details of the story are fictionalized.\u00a0 And I can believe that.\u00a0 But this is a movie not a history lesson so the real question is whether the movie entertains.\u00a0 And the answer to that (in my opinion) is absolutely.\u00a0 Pitt portrays Beane as a former player who has a grudge against the scouting system that lures kids, who won\u2019t be successful baseball players, into the game.\u00a0 He gave up a full scholarship to Stanford to play for the Mets and then wash out.\u00a0 He sees a scientific evaluation of players as the way to avoid all the chaos that, in his view, the scouts seem to cause.\u00a0 Pitt has a good script and he makes the most of it.\u00a0 And Pitt and Hill have a very amusing Mutt and Jeff relationship with the confident Beane mentoring the awkward and inexperienced Brand in how to work with the athletes.\u00a0 Philip Seymour Hoffman as Art Howe gives a disgruntled old-timer portrayal that fits the story well.\u00a0 And there are more than a few very strong performances among the actors portraying the scouts and ball players.\u00a0 All in all, it\u2019s a very interesting baseball story and I think well worth the time to watch it.\u00a0 Highly recommended to baseball fans and movie fans in general.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Moneyball is a somewhat fictionalized story about how Oakland Athletics\u2019 General Manager Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt) brings advanced statistical analysis (sabermetrics) to the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239,237],"tags":[468,4175,43,38,1355],"class_list":["post-34396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-reviews","tag-baseball","tag-brad-pitt","tag-movie-review","tag-review","tag-reviews"],"yoast_head":"\n