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MLB's Billy Bean Has Died

Billy Beane -- no relation to Billy Bean -- was a baseball analytics pioneer who, while GM of the Oakland A's, "ruined baseball" by finding value in players conventional baseball thinkers regarded as undesirable -- power hitters with low batting averages who drew high numbers of walks, for instance. Such players were cheaper to acquire and pay than those who met traditional standards for success (batting averages over .300, proficiency in hitting singles, etc.), and enabled Beane to build a strong, contending A's team for much less money than, say, the Yankees.
 
Billy Beane -- no relation to Billy Bean -- was a baseball analytics pioneer who, while GM of the Oakland A's, "ruined baseball" by finding value in players conventional baseball thinkers regarded as undesirable -- power hitters with low batting averages who drew high numbers of walks, for instance. Such players were cheaper to acquire and pay than those who met traditional standards for success (batting averages over .300, proficiency in hitting singles, etc.), and enabled Beane to build a strong, contending A's team for much less money than, say, the Yankees.
He also ushered in analytics and that is what really ruined the sport.
 
He also ushered in analytics and that is what really ruined the sport.
That's what I said -- analytics pioneer. The sad thing about analytics is that the hypotheses they are based on are, in fact, true. You'll score more runs and win more games with a lineup of nine .215 hitters who hit 30 homers and walk 100 times than you will with nine .315 hitters who hit 5 homers and walk 15 times. It makes baseball a less interesting game to watch, I agree, but it's hard to force people in the game -- whose job it is to win -- to go back to the old assumptions just to make the game more eye-appealing. Eliminating the shift has worked to an extent, but high-strikeout, low-contact, high-power, high-walk baseball is likely here to stay.
 
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