Why? (Part II)

As I was driving south on I-880 on my way to work today, I noticed a funny thing at the Oakland Alameda-Coliseum. The tarp covering the top rows of seats was missing. This is unusual during baseball season, and since there's no Raider preseason game happening anytime soon, it struck me as odd for a moment. Then I suddenly realized why the tarps are off....today was the first day of principle photography for the movie adaptation of Moneyball.

The other thing that struck me as odd, is that after being initially shelved, the Moneyball Project was re-lit with screenwriter Aaron Sorkin taking over. For the life of me, I still can't figure out why this movie is being made, much less which casting director is high off their ass for casting Brad Pitt as Billy Beane and Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Art Howe? For those who never got around to reading the book, the best way to succinctly summarize it is that the Oakland A's were the first team to use sabermetrics in their approach to fielding a winning team NOT because they WANTED to, but because they were forced to because they don't have nearly the budget, fan attendance, or television/radio deals the Major Market teams have.

The book is a good read overall, if not an arrogant read. It's written by a very smug, know-it-all guy in Michael Lewis who's a great writer, just ask him and he'll tell you. Lewis also writes in a way that almost seems like lecturing the reader at certain parts. In a way he was perfect for writing about Billy Beane, as Beane is very much like Lewis in that he also believes he has a better pot to piss in.

Both Beane's and Lewis' arrogance and perpetual self-congratualtions would be fine though if there wasn't one little flaw...it didn't work. The Oakland A's have won exactly ONE playoff series in 11 years that they've been implementing sabermetrics in their organizational philiosophy. They claim that no matter what you try to do as an organization the playoffs are a "crapshoot". Funny how the Yankees don't really believe that, but OK. The other problem Moneyball has, is the Minnesota Twins. Up until recently, the Twins didn't have any damn money either. Rather than dive in with both feet into the Sabermetrics pool, the Twins actually did something crazy and built a farm system that was designed to develop young players that are very skilled defensively to come in to replace any superstars they developed once they left for greener pastures financially (read Torii Hunter and Johan Santana). The Twins also managed to beat those genius Oakland A's in the 2002 playoffs.

I could go on and on about why I don't think Moneyball is the End All Be All, but that's not the point. The point is, what is this movie going to be about? If it's about the role Sabermetrics played in getting baseball fans to rethink and re-evaluate players and teams, fine. I actually agree with that, and have come to appreciate baseball more as a result of the advanced stats, but I'm not sure that really translates to the big screen though? If it's about the genius and courage of Billy Beane, then the movie is going to have a VERY unhappy ending. If it's about charismatic characters, then they are going to have to take a lot of liberties with the truth because 90% of the people involved are about as interesting and dynamic as a block of cheese.

Which leads me to my original question, why is this movie being made? More importantly, who is it being made for? A's fans? I'm not sure they'll be too thrilled about this trip down memory lane. Baseball fans? Well....OK I guess but again there's that whole near ZERO playoff success thing. See where I'm going with this?

Obviously Stephen Soderbergh figured out this movie is destined to be a box office turd. Aaron Sorkin has done some good work in the past, but even he will be faced with a challenge that nobody seems to be able to answer:

How was Moneyball something more than just "Hudson, Mulder, and Zito"?