The movie ‘Moneyball’ has Cubs connections
SAN DIEGO — Had a chance to see the movie “Moneyball” the other day.
For my money, so to speak, it was one of those rare instances where the movie was better than the book, and the book was pretty darn good. Without going all movie reviewer on you, I thought the movie did a much better job of humanizing Oakland Athletics GM Billy Beane better than the book. I guess Brad Pitt will do that.
There are Cubs connections to the movie, and I had a chance to talk with some of them this evening here at Petco Park.
And as it always goes with these things, you find out that “based on a true story” means just that. There is definitely some fudging with the “truth.”
Take Cubs first baseman Carlos Pena, for instance. In the movie, Beane tells his assistant to give the word to Pena that he had been traded to Detroit.
“Movies are not always exact — I was in Triple-A,” Pena said. “It’s a little bit of an adaptation. I came off the field in Sacramento. My manager at Sacramento said, ‘Hey, Carlos, stay put because I think something’s going on.’ That’s the way it went down.”
The movie had Beane moving Pena because he wanted to get playing time at first base for Scott Hatteberg, a “Moneyball” example of an undervalued player who could be had inexpensively and still produce.
Along those lines, “Moneyball” — the book and the movie — is not “about on-base percentage.” Sure, players with high OBPs were favored by the “Moneyball” set, but “Moneyball” really is about identifying inefficiencies in the marketplace and exploiting them. Or as Beane put it in the movie, it’s about finding value in players no one else can see based on statistical analysis.
The ironic thing is that Pena, his now-high salary notwithstanding, is that type of player: high OBP, power and with little concern about the high strikeout rate because, after all, an out is an out no matter how it comes.
“At that moment, it was more important for the A’s to get a pitcher,” Pena said, noting that Oakland got Jeff Weaver from Detroit. The A’s later sent Jeremy Bonderman to Detroit to complete the deal. “I was part of a trade for them to get the pitcher they coveted.
“That’s the ironic thing. According to the philosophy, I would be a guy you’d want.”
As far as the “Moneyball” idea goes, Pena says he likes it.
“I think it’s really cool,” he said. “It’s very cool to look at the game in a different light and in a different way. It opens some eyes because we’re used to looking at things in a certain way because it’s been done that way over the years. There are things that are overlooked that are important to creating a winning ballclub.”
For the acid test, I went to the scout’s scout, Gary Hughes, a special assistant to the Cubs’ GM. Hughes has been named one of the top 10 scouts of the 20th century.
“Moneyball” seemed to diminish the value of scouts in favor of statistical analysis. The movie also did some stereotyping, showing scouts sitting around a table with a pile of doughnuts in the middle.
So, Mr. Hughes, what did you think?
“I enjoyed it; I thought it was a good movie,” he said. “I was disappointed in some of the portrayals, of (A’s manager) Art Howe, in particular. I thought that was really unfair. Art Howe is one of the few people in baseball to win 100 games back to back.
“It was sad what they did with (A’s scouting director) Grady Fuson. All teams now use sabermetrics to one extent or another. But you’ve got to have a combination of stats and scouting. The movie was good. I would recommend it to anybody. Everybody’s jumped on it (the ‘Moneyball’ concept).”