The Moneyball that Based on True Story of the Oakland Athletics - Movie Review Example

College of Business Sciences Business Global Strategy MSIB - BUS 664 “MONEYBALL” Done by: Eman Al Rumi ID: M80004204‎ ‎ Facilitator:  Dr. Hanko Zeitzmann Date: July, 2014 Zayed University, Abu Dhabi Campus Content College of Business Sciences 1 Business Global Strategy 1 MSIB - BUS 664 1 Facilitator:  Dr. Hanko Zeitzmann 1 Date: July, 2014 1 Content 1 Introduction & Literature Review 2 Overview 3 Analysis of the Movie/Book 4 Conclusion 8 References 10 Content 2 Introduction & Literature Review 3 Overview 3 Analysis of the Movie/Book 4 The New Model 4 Billy is a Brilliant Leader 5 Management Lessons 6 Conclusion 7 References 9 Introduction & Literature Review The movie “Moneyball” was based on the true story of the 2002 Oakland Athletics (or “A’s”) General Manager Billy Beane and Peter Brand. The story is also covered in the bestselling non-fiction book by financial journalist Michael Lewis. The movie “Moneyball” tells how Beane and his young economics-whiz assistant changed the fortunes of the Oakland Athletics using a new management tactic called “sabermetrics” (Ifing, 2013). This strategy involved applying statistics to examine the number of times players stayed ‘on base’ (thereby increasing their likelihood to score runs), rather than relying on the traditional method of valuing players’ batting average. This new strategy allowed the team to buy players that they could afford and that represented high statistics that the team valued; thus making them able to take on top league teams by simply using a different approach than they did. This paper is going to review the movie in the context of business strategy management and elaborate the key business lessons that can be learnt from the movie. Overview The movie “Moneyball” is mainly concerned with the idea of explaining the way the Oakland Athletics (Oakland As), one of the poorest teams in baseball, won so many games in 2002. The main character in the book and movie is Billy Bean who was the general manager of the Oakland As (Lewis, 2011). Billy and his assistant started looking for ways to rethink baseball and develop new knowledge that would help in rating baseball players (determine their respective value). Billy’s main focus was to change the way traditional baseball is thought, a factor that made him, in the movie, to hire Paul DePodesta who was a Harvard economics graduate and a mathematician (Lewis, 2011). Together, Peter and Billy began analyzing statistics of baseball as the foundation of identifying most undervalued players so that they could buy them. Analysis of the Movie/Book At the heart of ““Moneyball”” is the fact that strategy underpins each and every decision that is made. Whereas it is true that the leadership and dynamic decision-making is a necessary complement of the way in which the teams manager engages with his players, the success of the Oakland A’s can be attributed to strategy above all else. Within this particular strategy, the team began to realize that existing statistics that defined the way in which the game of baseball is played and the way in which players were bought and sold was fundamentally flawed. Instead of placing a high emphasis upon batting averages, the owner instead opted to focus upon slugging percentage and on-base percentage as better measurements of overall chance of success (Rex, 2011). Whereas one needs to have a relatively thorough understanding of the game of baseball in order to determine how each of these success, it is at least superficially sufficient to understand the fact that the Oakland Athletics utilize difficult to determine that the likelihood of winning baseball game was ultimately contingent upon the score; something that all individuals would necessarily agree with – regardless of their level of baseball understanding or problems. As such, slugging percentage and on-base percentage, when analyzed statistically, proved to be a far better measurement of whether or not success would ultimately be achieved. The brilliance of the strategy lies in the fact that the Oakland Athletics were almost one of the poorest teams within major league baseball. Whereas the New York Yankees have over $125 million each and every year that was dedicated to finding the best players, the Oakland Athletics has less than 50 million (Roger, 2011). Because of this disparity, the owners of the team, in tandem with the manager, determined that an alternate approach must be taken if the Oakland Athletics were to be successful and win games. As can relevantly be understood, this alternate approach was represented in terms of analyzing the statistical information utilized within baseball in determining whether or not this information was ultimately useful in terms of the strategy that the Oakland Athletics should ultimately pursue. In terms of strategic goal, it must be understood that the Oakland Athletics had the strategic goal of finding and hiring undervalued players. The distinct advantage that the ball team had is with respect to the fact that these undervalued players were obviously represented at a significantly lower price as compared to those that were moderately valued more highly valued. Due to the fact that the Oakland Athletics could not afford moderately valued or highly valued prospects, this was only a reasonable approach to seeking to build an effective baseball team with the monetary constraints that face them. Accordingly, as teams such as the Boston Red Sox, the Atlanta Braves, and the New York Yankees past up on “undervalued players”, the Oakland Athletics were able to snap these individuals up and incorporate them on to their team; with a relatively low hit to the pocketbook and bottom line. Naturally, this particular process was not foolproof and it took a great deal of training and engagement to form a winning team from this hodgepodge of undervalued players. However, focusing upon the talents and percentages that other teams did not, be Oakland Athletics were ultimately able to exhibit a winning season and compete with the likes of teams spent fully three times more than they did on their players. It should further be noted that this particular strategy, although highly effective also highly dangerous. The owners and manager of the Oakland Athletics were running an extreme gamble with regard to the success that this particular strategic approach might engage (Stephan, 2012). Regardless of this gamble, it should further be understood that a team which had adequate monetary resources and coaching ability might not have engaged with the statistical approach that the Oakland Athletics did as a result of desperation. As with anything, necessity is the mother of invention and the Oakland Athletics were able to develop a new system of measurement to determine whether or not they could compete and be relevant within a realm of support that was dominated by high budget teams with a high visibility, large ticket sales and televised games. As both the book and the movie revealed, the gamble ultimately paid off. Due to the fact that the Oakland Athletics build a team based upon different metrics other individuals within major league baseball valued, base percentage, batting averages, runs scored, average, and almost every other identifiable metrics increased year-to-year. Interestingly, even though the strategic approach of the Oakland Athletics was extraordinarily beneficial and assisted them towards competing with some of the major teams throughout major league baseball, the implementation of this particular strategy was relatively short-lived by its very nature. What is meant by this has to do with the fact that the Oakland Athletics publicized their approach and engaged with an alternate set of metrics which raised much attention throughout major league baseball, many other teams soon adopted this particular approach and began to utilize the same standards as a function of training excess budget from their overhead and effecting a more powerful and dynamic team. In this way, the degree and extent to which the Oakland Athletics could continue to participate within this strategic engagement as a function of winning games and differentiating themselves from the competition came to be reduced your year. However, regardless of this fact, it is still noteworthy that the team was able to utilize statistics as a means of redefining a game that has been in existence for over 100 years. Furthermore, even though the particular approach that was illustrated within ““Moneyball”” is not necessarily still the one employed by the Oakland Athletics, the ability to think outside the box, to engage with alternate approaches, and to fundamentally shift the way in which baseball is understood and played represents an open-minded approach to management and strategy. For this very reason, analyst within the business world and professors alike have pointed to this particular book as a useful guide map to how organizations can seek to grow and thrive in markets that are dominated by more powerful, richer, and oftentimes better firms. Rather than defining the world based upon whether or not adequate supplies of money exists in terms of creating eventual success, interpretation of metrics, the use of statistic understanding, and other approaches can be used as a means of affecting the very same goal. Conclusion In conclusion, the tale of the “Moneyball” discussed in the film is based on a true story of the Oakland Athletics team also known as the“A’s”. The story revolves around a brilliant general team manager by the name Billy Beane and his assistant Peter Brand. This story has a wide application in business management because Billy (the general manager) is portrayed to possess incredible business management strategies that made the team a success. One of the main lessons learnt from this story is the idea of good leadership whereby Billy has been depicted as a brilliant leader who understood the various leadership styles. He regularly changed his leadership style until he settled on the most effective one. Creativity and willingness to embrace change are other core business subthemes that are evident in this story. Billy’s creativity enabled him adopt a new technique of accurately valuing players unlike the conventional approaches that were used by the coaches. In general, this story has numerous business themes and lessons that can be learnt from Billy’s management techniques. Once again, the reader should appreciate the fact that even though the creativity and imagination of the teams manager was essential and defining the way in which success was realized, it was ultimately the role of his assistant that allowed for the team to appreciate the usefulness of statistics and mathematics in terms of redefining the way in which the game was played redefining the manner through which the Oakland Athletics sought to compete with some of the more successful teams throughout major league baseball. References Top of Form Bottom of Form Top of Form Top of Form Ifing, J. (2013). 100 common misconceptions about "“Moneyball”". S.l.: Book On Demand. Lewis, M. (2011). “Moneyball”: The art of winning an unfair game. New York: W.W. Norton. Lewis, M. M. (2003). “Moneyball”: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game. New York. Rex, R. (2011). Film Review: “Moneyball”. Retrieved  2014, from http://www.filmjournal.com/filmjournal/content_display/reviews/major-releases/e3ifd7d56cab0dcc3b3e14ffb7009df9522 Roger, E. (2011). “Moneyball” Movie Review & Film Summary (2011) | Roger Ebert. Retrieved  2014, from http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/”Moneyball”-2011 Stephan, P. E. (2012). How economics shapes science. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press. Bottom of Form Bottom of Form Read More