Michael Lewis says Moneyball made baseball more boring

Another year older, and he’d lose to Rocky Marciano.

 

He was talking about the White Sox.

 

Baseball Prospectus and Baseball Primer were pretty big around the time John Henry bought the Red Sox. A few of the posters got major league jobs from research they did independently.

 

The stat I saw a couple of years ago was telling: More than one-third of the at-bats in baseball result in the ball not being put into play: homers, strikeouts, walks and hit batters.

The analytics are great over a 162-game season and getting to a 90-72 record to make the playoffs. Not so good for a seven-game series.

 

Lewis’ message is correct, what helps you win a game isn’t what we grew up looking to see in a baseball game. Fielding mattered, bunts mattered. Yes HRs were cool but that was because it was a special event. Now every position player is swinging for the fences; seeing Reggie go down swinging was exciting; seeing the .225 SS go down swinging (and most everyone else) not so much.

 

I get most of the critiques.

But people pining for more bunts need to get a life.

 

Funny, many of the same people who claim to pine for more bunts go into screeching fits over the "ghost runner" rule in extra innings, despite the fact that the one thing it undeniably does is instantly resurrect the sac bunt as a strategically optimal move.

 

Something made baseball MORE boring? Gotta say that is a very impressive feat.

 

Chicks dig the long-brawl.

 

I'll gently push back on this, especially considering my lifelong favorite team did tank to get better and won the 2016 World Series.

With expanded playoffs now, though, I think more MLB teams feel like they are in the hunt longer than they did in the past. KC is a good example this year. MLB teams know that their tournament is the most random one of all of them, and anyone who makes the tournament has a real chance, just like the D'Backs last year. It's made for a less interesting trade deadline the last few years because more teams go for it than in the past.

 

Tanking.

Except for Yankees. You can't tank on Broadway.

 

The 2019 Nationals are also a great example of how anything can happen in a baseball postseason. The “best” team sometimes doesn’t win, which is what makes baseball’s diluted postseason more interesting to me.