Billy Beane

Words: 1085
Pages: 5

1. Based on the “Billy Beane: Changing the Game” case, explain how and why the Oakland A’s economic situation after 1995 shaped it's:
Compensation strategies
At a time when major league baseball was booming and teams paid their players millions of dollars to secure victories, Oakland A defied the law of baseball economics by winning 102 games and lost only 60 in 2001.Despite working on a small and tight budget, the team still managed top rankings against major league players. There was a great competitive imbalance as bigger teams would pay their player millions of dollar compared to their counterparts. However, under Billy`s management and a 34million dollar budget, the team looked for alternative sources of finding players that would fit
…show more content…
This was an approach which was systematic and statistical in terms of players and teams evaluation. The team deemphasized sacrifice bunt strategy use in their training and development. This frowned upon strategy entailed a hitter sacrificing himself for the sole purpose the advancement of a player who was presently on the base paths. The first training and development strategy was the on-base percentage concept which measured a player’s frequency in the safely reaching base by means of a work, hit or any other means. This strategy was inexpensive while at the same time having a significant impact on the ability of scoring runs by the team. The team took in college players with experience as opposed to young players since they had undergone more training and development. When the team hired Scott, they knew he was not as talented as their former player Jason Giambi in terms of home runs. Giambi would hit many home runs in his last season at Oakland while Scott would only manage an average of 15 home run hits for the entire season. With this in mind, they implemented the strategy of diversifying of the offensive production to the entire team as well as replacing the whole team’s run …show more content…
Additionally, Beane highly drafted young college player. He could draft them in the first round which was quite high compared to his counterparts who drafted players in the 15th round of armature draft. This was particularly risky as he was not assured of their future performance. The team also hires Scott as a replacement of their traded superstar Jason Giambi. Scott had been hurt and no longer had the ability to effectively throw the ball. The budget constraints challenge made Beane trade off two key star pitchers. This HR strategy worked to the disadvantage of the team. With his decision to go with younger pitchers who were less expensive, this affected the team’s performance negatively since it took time for the players’ pitching prospects to grow. The dismantling of the Oakland A’s management also worked to the disadvantage of the team (Reider,