THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
TUESDAY OCTOBER 1, 2013
QUOTE OF THE DAY
PAGE 7
Beane was named the As GM in 1997, and since then he has led OakLand to 11 winning seasons and six playoff appearances.
- Baseball reference
TRIVIA OF THE DAY
Q: Who plays Billy Beane in the Major Motion Picture?
A: Brad Pitt
THE MORNING BREW The Royals are one book away from the playoffs
With their 4-1 victory over the Chicago White Sox on Sunday, the Kansas City Royals finished
the 2013 baseball season ten whole games above .500, at 86-76. It was the club's best record since winning 92 games in 1989, and the first time they earned the "winning team" rep since 2003.
All in all, it was a successful year by Kansas City standards. Remember, is a team that has lost 100 games in four of the last 12 seasons, and 90 games in five of the remaining eight.
So yes, for a team with a bar set as dismally low as the Royals', 86 wins is more than enough reason to throw a party.
But what if I told you that the Royals, yes, the Kansas City Royals with just an $80 million payroll (as compared to the New York Yankee's $229 million), were one 280-page book away from not only making the playoffs, but possibly winning a World Series?
I'm so generous that I'll even tell you the name of that book: "Moneyball" by Michael Lewis.
The secret is out; three teams with lesser payrolls than the Royals - Oakland, Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay - are all playing postseason baseball, while the Royals sit at home for the 28th year in a row. And yes, all these teams embrace Moneyball; the Royals don't. And one of them, the Oakland As, is actually credited as the trailblazer itself.
"Moneyball" tells the story of general manager Billy Beane and his poor, downtrodden Oakland As. Like all GM's, Beane has to find
a way to field a competitive baseball team, which is hard enough as it is. The catch is that Beane has to do this with a significant financial disadvantage. The New York Yankees, a team Beane will learn how to beat with unconventional baseball knowledge, pay their players three times the amount Beane can scrap together for his team.
Glamorized stats such as stolen bases, RBI (runs batted in) and batting average are rigorously proven flawed and therefore thrown out the window. Speed and contact are also rendered irrelevant. Not to mention, defensive play is drastically overvalued.
With the help of an analytical, evidence-based, sabermetric approach to assembling a baseball team, founded by Lawrence native, Bill James, Beane takes the As into the playoffs despite all odds and his disadvantaged revenue situation, setting the record for most consecutive regular season wins (20).
How?
Pitches seen, on-base percentage and slugging percentage, as statistical analysis proves, are better indicators of offensive
success. This is because they are deemed the most relevant stats to producing runs. Therefore, Moneyball also says, college athletes are better to draft because they have a larger sample size of these stats than high school players. These Moneyball players are affordable because they don't produce the conventional stats that scouts salivate over, but the ones that matter and are often overlooked.
Winning the war of attrition by wearing the starting pitcher down and getting to the bullpen, getting on base, and hitting the ball far all lead to runs and runs beet wins. It's not rocket science, but the Royals try to make it that.
Proof?
1) First-baseman Eric Hosmer was benched on Sunday to preserve his 302 batting average. By conventional baseball standards, that is a significant feat. The Royals agree. Moneyball doesn't.
2) The Royals saw 23,013 pitches all year. Boston saw 25,668. Oakland saw 24,500.
3) The Royals took only 422 walks (26 out of 30) as compared to Tampa Bay, Boston, and Oakland (2, 3, and 4) who each took over 550.
4) The Royals were 24th in slugging percentage. Boston was first, Oakland was fourth, and Tampa was tenth.
5) The Royals constantly draft high school players. Have you ever heard of Chris Lubanski? Yeah, neither had I.
The Royals had arguably one of the best defenses in the past 20 years according
to fielding statistics, highlighted by Lorenzo Cain, Salvador Perez, and company. However, the A's are perennially one of the worst, and the Tigers are old and boot the ball around. Yet, these teams are in the postseason again and the Royals are not.
Oakland continues to boggle minds after winning the American League West Division again, and the Boston Red Sox, with the help of Bill James, their Senior Advisor on Baseball Operations, finished with the best record in baseball.
The Royals stubbornly scoff at this new way of thinking. 'The neds are trying to desensitize or harden a beautiful game,' they say. 'Poetry in motion.'
False. These "nerds" with degrees from Harvard are just proving that the eye is deceptive, and the numbers don't lie.
David Glass, the miser that he is, isn't the real problem. The approach is the problem. Stop fighting the proven system, you yahoos. Put down the sword, and pick up the book. This team is talented already, and if they would just listen to the numbers, the sky, really, is the limit.
This week in athletics
Edited by Ashleigh Tidwell
Tuesday
Men's Golf Badger Invitational All Day Madison, Wis.
Women's Golf
2013 Challenge
at Onion Creek
All Day
Austin, Texas
Wednesday
Volleyball Kansas State 7 p.m. Manhattan
Thursday
Women's Swimming Intrasquad 3:30 p.m. Lawrence
Friday
Soccer
Iowa State
7 p.m.
Ames, Iowa
Saturday
Football Texas Tech 11 a.m. Lawrence
Volleyball
Baylor
TBA
Waco, Texas
Cross Country
Rim Rock Classic
TBA
Lawrence
Sunday
Soccer Texas 1 p.m. Lawrence
Rowing
Head of Oklahoma
Day one
Oklahoma City, OKla
Rowing
Head of Oklahoma
Final Results
Oklahoma City, Okla.
Monday
No Events
FOOTBALL
He is eligible to play immediately.
Marquel combs announces transfer to Southeastern Louisiana
Defensive tackle Maruel Combs, a headliner of the much-heralded Charlie Weis recruiting class heading this summer, has transferred to Southeastern Louisiana
after a short stint with Kansas. Combs didn't see any snaps and saw his name disappear from the depth chart just last week.
Combs, a 4-star recruit from Woodlands Hills, Calif. was recruited by the likes of Tennessee, Nebraska and A&M before choosing Kansas.
Conner Oberkrom
GOLF
Megan McChrystal takes title at Symetra Tour
ASSOCIATED PRESS
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Megan McChrystal birdied the final hole Monday to win the season-ending Symetra Tour Championship, and P.K. Kongkraphan won the money title to take one of 10 LPGA Tour cards.
A stroke ahead of South Africa's Paula Reto when play was suspended Sunday because of darkness. McChrystal made a 7-foot
birdie putt on her lone hole Monday to beat France's Perrine Delacour by two strokes. McChrystal, a former LSU player from Stuart, Fla., had 4-aunder 68 to finish at 13-under 275 on LPGA International's Champions Course.
"I think I might cry," McChrystal said. "This gives me the confidence I need for Q school. Last year, I was terrified. Now, I know I'm ready."
She earned $18,750 to jump from
58th to 18th on the money list with $27,238. Nos. 11-20 on the money list received spots in the final stage of the qualifying tournament in December.
"My goal was to make it high enough on the money list to make it to the final stage," McChrystal said. "I just wanted to prove to myself that I could shoot par or better through four rounds. It'll make Q school easier knowing that I'm capable of doing that."
Delacour closed with a 66 on Sunday. She was the only player to move into the top 10 on the money list in the finale, earning $11,590 to jump from 20th to eighth.
Reto shot 72, making a bogey and a par Monday, to finish third at 10 under.
Kongkraphan, from Thailand,
tied for seventh at 4 under. She
finished the season with $47,283.
Giulia Molinaro was second at
$39,848, followed by Marina Alex ($39,804), Christine Song ($39,309), Cydney Clanton ($38,861), Sue Kim ($37,850), Hannah Jun ($36,810) Delacour ($34,577), Alena Sharp ($34,120) and lacynl Sweeney ($33,609).
Sweeney tied for 22nd at even par to edge Olivia Jordan-Higgins by $114 for the final LPGA Tour card. Higgins, eighth on the money list entering the tournament, missed the cut.
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