Moneyball by Michael Lewis

The first book I’m going to review is the 2003 book Moneyball by Michael Lewis, who also wrote The Blind Side. The reason I chose this one first is because it was the first one in the box of books I ordered from Amazon! But really, this book is being made into a movie that’s coming out in September, with Brad Pitt as the main actor. There are already calls for him to win the Oscar for Best Actor. That’s not the reason I wanted to read the book though. The storyline is really intriguing to me.

The book is about the Oakland A’s baseball team and their unprecedented success in the early 2000s even though they were one of the poorest teams in the MLB. Based on a true story, the author gives a behind the scenes look at how they were able to accomplish so much with so little. Michael Lewis gives a lot of background of baseball terminology, as if the reader knew nothing about baseball. I suppose that is good for a novice reader, but as a baseball fan, it makes parts read slow. There’s many statistical references (which is probably why I liked the book so much), but none are overly complicated; he takes the time to explain them and there’s no hard math. A big feature of the book is on the general manager of the Oakland A’s, Billy Beane. At times it can almost seem like a biography. But the books is not a biography about him, as some critics have said. Telling the stories of Billy Beane and individual players makes the storyline much more real and compelling.

I really liked this book because I am a fan of true stories and it highlights the application of statistics. I thought it was interesting that after the book was written, teams from the NBA, NFL, NHL, Fortune 500 companies, Wall Street firms, and Hollywood studios contacted the Oakland Athletics to learn more about their ways. Everyone except other MLB teams, which is really the most shocking part about Moneyball. The “Club” of baseball insiders still felt that the Oakland A's were a fluke. An aberration. Luck. (However, it should be said that the Boston Red Sox quickly adapted Billy Beane’s data-driven strategies shortly after Oakland’s success. Result: two championships.)

I would highly recommend the book for baseball fans, statistics majors, analytical careers, and those interested in learning of efficiency using data. The story truly gives an insider’s view of what it’s like to be in the front office of a MLB team or a player struggling to make it through the minor leagues. 

My rating for Moneyball: 4 stars out of 5. Read Moneyball here!