I recently finished reading “Moneyball”, the national bestselling book about baseball by Michael Lewis. I am always amazed when I mention the book to my baseball fan friends. It is always, “Oh, that’s the Billy Beane book.” They seem to think the book was written by Billy Beane, the visionary general manager of the Oakland A’s or, if not written by him, was written about him.
The fact is that “Moneyball” is no more about Billy Beane than “The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire” is about Nero or “The DaVinci Code” is about Jesus Christ. Major characters, yes. But not the real focus of the story.
The fact is that the real story of “Moneyball” is captured in its subtitle, “The art of winning an unfair game”. At its essence, it’s about finding ways to succeed when challenged by circumstances.
To set the scene, “Moneyball” positions baseball as an “unfair game” because Major League Baseball teams, dependent on the size of their market, have vastly different resources (budgets to spend on players’ salaries). Small market teams like the A’s are constrained to very limited salaries while big market teams like the Yankees can spend almost whatever they want to acquire the best and most expensive players. How then can any small market team even hope to succeed when faced with this, seemingly overwhelming challenge?
“Moneyball” proposes that it can be done - indeed was done by the A’s under the direction of Billy Beane – by adopting Challenger Brand behavior.
What was this Challenger Brand behavior specifically demonstrated in “Moneyball”?click for more
Out-think rather than out-spend the competition – Much like Challenger Brand marketers, the need to out-think rather than out-spend is not something that small market baseball teams chose to do. It is something they have to do for they have no alternative. In an “unfair game”, governed by players with vastly different resources, the only way for under-funded competitors to compete with their more well-funded rivals is to find new ways to win, that is, to out-think them.
Break from the conventions of the category – If there is a theme that runs through almost every page of “Moneyball” it is that the “status quo” of baseball had been doing things the same way for over a century. No one knows why some of the accepted conventions were done but no one was ready to stop doing them either. What were they? I think the most prevalent accepted – but erroneous – baseball convention in “Moneyball” is that something useful could be learned about baseball from watching it. Therefore, the extensive network of scouts and scouting capabilities fielded by every team. The book is packed with examples of how the old-school way of scouts evaluating the game and its players was flawed. The book amply demonstrates that rigorous statistical analysis is a far more valid predictor of baseball success than personal observation. While this concept has gained some acceptance among MLB executives in the time since “Moneyball” was written, I’m still surprised by the resistance by many in the baseball status quo who reject it. Just recently I asked two players, one a former all star and the other a current all-star about this idea. Both were adamant that there is no way to evaluate a player without watching him play extensively.
Of course, in baseball, as in marketing, doing things the same way as everybody else – but with less money to do it – is a sure road to failure.
Become a “thought leader” in your category – The thought that dominates “Moneyball” is that certain – undervalued and therefore less costly – skills had a huge impact on the main objective of baseball, i.e., scoring runs. By using newly emerging filed of computer-aided statistical analysis, the A’s were able to identify the skills that had the most impact on run production. More importantly, they were also able to use the statistical analyses to identify the players that had these skills and whose salaries were affordable. That this approach produced the desired results (the A’s qualified for the playoffs each year despite one of the lowest team salaries in baseball) did not go unnoticed by the other teams. Today, some of the most successful teams and general managers all subscribe to the “Moneyball” approach of systematic statistical analysis. If that’s not being a thought leader, I don’t know what is.
One final thought. The theme of “Moneyball” is that a lack of resources mandated the Challenger Brand Behavior by the A’s. However, it is apparent that a Challenger Brand approach is more than just something to be pursued when faced with being outspent. The principles are sound for any team – or marketer – under any circumstances. If Challenger Brand behavior is effective when being outspent, imagine how well it will work when the resources are sufficient for the task at hand.
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