03-09-2021, 03:38 AM
Moneyball only works if you have good scouts, good coaches, AND know something good that other teams don't. The Bengals don't even have 1 of those 3, let alone all 3.
The lesson of Moneyball wasn't that you should go as cheaply as possible, it was identifying what is truly valuable (OBP in their case) that is being undervalued by the market and finding guys who can give you the most bang for the buck. There's no equivalent to that in the NFL. It is also worth noting that it quickly fell apart because other teams instantly caught on to what was going on and thus the advantage stopped working. (They won 7 less games the next year, 5 less more the year after that, 3 less more the year after that.)
That's even considering they had young talent under control and had both the MVP and the Cy Young winner that year (from drafting and developing). The Bengals don't have an equivalent to that, either.
What is overlooked in Moneyball is that the Athletics didn't even win a postseason series that year. Or the next year. Or even go to the postseason either of the 2 years after that. It was really only a "success" story for the owner, because he managed to get some good regular seasons out of being a cheapskate.
You take a bunch of castoff players, plug them into a crappy team, and give that team to crappy coaches, and you're going to have a crappy team.
The lesson of Moneyball wasn't that you should go as cheaply as possible, it was identifying what is truly valuable (OBP in their case) that is being undervalued by the market and finding guys who can give you the most bang for the buck. There's no equivalent to that in the NFL. It is also worth noting that it quickly fell apart because other teams instantly caught on to what was going on and thus the advantage stopped working. (They won 7 less games the next year, 5 less more the year after that, 3 less more the year after that.)
That's even considering they had young talent under control and had both the MVP and the Cy Young winner that year (from drafting and developing). The Bengals don't have an equivalent to that, either.
What is overlooked in Moneyball is that the Athletics didn't even win a postseason series that year. Or the next year. Or even go to the postseason either of the 2 years after that. It was really only a "success" story for the owner, because he managed to get some good regular seasons out of being a cheapskate.
You take a bunch of castoff players, plug them into a crappy team, and give that team to crappy coaches, and you're going to have a crappy team.
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