Moneyball

The Art of Winning an Unfair Game

By: Michael Lewis

Narrated by: Michael Lewis

Length: 5 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

"I wrote this book because I fell in love with a story." But the idea for the book came well before I had good reason to write it - before I had a story to fall in love with. It began, really, with an innocent question: how did one of the poorest teams in baseball, the Oakland Athletics, win so many games?

With these words Michael Lewis launches us into the funniest, smartest, and most contrarian book since, well, since Liar's Poker. Moneyball is a quest for something as elusive as the Holy Grail, something that money apparently can't buy: the secret of success in baseball. The logical places to look would be the front offices of major league teams, and the dugouts. But the real jackpot is a cache of numbers collected over the years by a strange brotherhood of amateur baseball enthusiasts: software engineers, statisticians, Wall Street analysts, lawyers and physics professors.

These numbers prove that the traditional yardsticks of success for players and teams are fatally flawed. This information has been around for years, and nobody paid it any mind. And then came Billy Beane, General Manager of the Oakland Athletics. Billy paid attention to those numbers, and this book records his astonishing experiment in finding and fielding a team that nobody else wanted.

In a narrative full of fabulous characters and brilliant excursions into the unexpected, Michael Lewis shows us how and why the new baseball knowledge works. He also sets up a sly and hilarious morality tale: Big Money, like Goliath, is always supposed to win...how can we not cheer for David?

©2003 Michael Lewis (P)2002 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

"The single most influential baseball book ever." (Rob Neyer, Slate)

"Another journalistic tour de force." (Wall Street Journal)

"Engaging, informative, and deliciously contrarian." (Washington Post)

"Lewis's reading is excellent....Not just for baseball fans, this story will impress anyone who understands that the way things are done can always be improved." (AudioFile)

Great Fun !!!

So I can't say that I spend much of my time in the sports pages, especially during baseball season (it probably has something to do with growing up in Cleveland during the dismal 70s and 80s seasons), but I still love this book.

This is baseball for those who (a) love the game, (b) like the game and (c) don't care about the game and wonder why some clods do.

Michael Lewis has always been able to explain interesting arcane worlds: High Tech in the New, New Thing, Wall Street in Liar Poker... He does the same thing for baseball.

Ever wondered how the heck you put together a baseball team (unless you are the Yankees and can just buy all the talent you want)? What the old way of picking talent is? What the new way is going to be? It is all here. Paradigms are broken, heroes are vanquished and reborn, the American way is made safe for another afternoon on the field of dreams (I had to, sorry).

This book is worth your time, one little warning: it is good enough you might find yourself forgetting some of your other commitments for just a couple more minutes of this book.

Enjoy!

Amazing book, unfortunately abridged.

I have to re-iterate what I read in terms of reviews prior to purchasing and listening to this book. Its a fantastic book. It sparked my interest in baseball again after losing interest many years ago. If you like numbers, money, sports and great stories, this will be a winner for you. Its definitely one of my favorites now.

I wish Michael would go back and record the unabridged version. While he's at it he could redo Liars Poker as well. I would spend the extra credits to hear the whole story.

A

This is a great look into how Billy breaks the mold and starts over in the hopelessness of baseball finance by truly separating talent "hype" from truth (statistics) - his battles with the inner machine to throw out old opinion and focus on performance is a great look into how one man revolutionized the business of baseball for the better; less glitz and overpaid stars and more true baseball talent making the MLB rosters - and oh yea,....its more affordable....A must read for any baseball fan and former player at most any level.

The Essential Michael Lewis

Moneyball, written and read by Michael Lewis, remains among one of my all time favorite non fiction audiobooks. The story is quintessentially Lewis in that it’s subject is so bewilderingly dry and presumably niche in appeal that it’s hard to imagine any other author channeling it into the best selling phenom it’s become. I’m not a baseball fan, and while I do work in a quantitative field, I find historical examples of applied statistics about as interesting as the next person. Which is not especially. And yet, Lewis defies your lack of interest in the underlying subject with rich character profiles and perfectly paced narrative. Just about my favorite ways to spend five-ish hours.

Value investing in the baseball world

Great meld of baseball passion and the value of finding that intangible quality that makes something a 'value'. I enjoyed the character studies as well as the baseball insight. The reading makes you feel like you're on the inside as they seek to make deals and keep their hidden secret to themselves. Recommended.

Great book but too short

This was a great book to learn about what makes a baseball player successful. I don't know if it was the abridgment, but the book just kind of ended. It didn't seem to flow very well. The information was wonderful and I would have liked to hear more of it.

Pure Bliss

This book is utterly fascinating. I am currently listening to it for the 3rd time in 3 weeks! Best book I've listened to in a long time. I highly recommend it!

Fantastic, even if you are not a sports fan

This book is fast-paced, well-written, and the author does a nice job with the reading. It packs great insight into the world in an interesting story.

Brilliant Baseball Literature

Being an avid baseball fan, as well as an avid reader, I've read all of the classics of baseball literature. This book ranks up there with Ted Williams' "My Turn at Bat" as one of the greatest works of baseball literature. I was fascinated with the excerpts published in the NY Times Magazine, and found the full text even more compelling.

As a baseball fan, and resident of the Bay Area, I've been fascinated with Billy Beane, the GM of the Oakland A's. I've wondered how this small market team, with one of the smallest budgets in baseball, could manage to field one of the most competitive teams, year after year, in a world where market forces drive top market teams to drive up spending quicker than a global arms race. This audio book explains it.

The Oakland A's unique strategy of drafting players that fit a particular mold (i.e., either hitters with high on base percentage, or 'mature' college pitchers without blistering stuff), that other teams shun, is revealed in Moneyball.

I highly recommend this audio book to all serious baseball fans who want to understand the highly successful formula of the Oakland A's. Enjoy!

Too short - Where is the unabridged version?

I seems to just get going, and then it's over. Kind of a waste of a credit.. read the book.