EXREYMoneyball: The True Story of Billy Beane and the 2002 Oakland A's
Yes. Moneyball (2011, starring Brad Pitt) is based on Michael Lewis's 2003 book about Billy Beane, general manager of the Oakland Athletics, who used statistical analysis to build a winning baseball team with one of the smallest budgets in the league. The 2002 A's won 103 games, including a then-record 20 games in a row. Jonah Hill's character, Peter Brand, is fictional, based on Beane's assistant Paul DePodesta.
Moneyball is a sports film with almost no big game in it. Its drama is in an office: a general manager with no money, a young analyst with a laptop, and an industry that does not want to hear that it has been valuing players wrong for a hundred years. Almost all of it is true.
The problem Billy Beane had
After the 2001 season the Oakland Athletics lost three of their best players - Jason Giambi, Johnny Damon and Jason Isringhausen - to richer clubs. Oakland's payroll was around a third of the New York Yankees'. Replacing stars with stars was impossible.
Billy Beane, a former top prospect whose own playing career had disappointed, was the A's general manager. Instead of looking for the players scouts liked, he looked for what actually produced runs and wins - above all, on-base percentage, how often a batter avoids making an out. Players who were good at that were cheap, because traditional scouting undervalued them.
The 2002 season
The film follows the real season closely. Oakland started badly, Beane traded away players the manager kept using, and then the team took off: from 13 August to 4 September 2002 the A's won 20 games in a row, an American League record at the time. The 20th win came on a walk-off home run by Scott Hatteberg, a former catcher Beane had turned into a first baseman - one of the film's best scenes, and it happened as shown.
Oakland finished with 103 wins but lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Minnesota Twins, which is why the film ends on a question rather than a triumph.
What the film changed
- Peter Brand doesn't exist. Jonah Hill's character is based on Paul DePodesta, Beane's Harvard-educated assistant general manager. DePodesta asked not to be named, so the character was renamed and made younger.
- Art Howe, the manager played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, has said the film unfairly showed him as an obstacle; in reality, the team's success also owed much to star pitchers Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder and Barry Zito and to shortstop Miguel Tejada, the 2002 MVP, whom the film barely mentions.
- The timeline is compressed, and several trades are simplified.
The offer from Boston
Also true: after the season the Boston Red Sox offered Beane the job of general manager with a record salary. He accepted, then changed his mind and stayed in Oakland. Boston hired Theo Epstein instead, used many of the same ideas, and won the World Series in 2004 - its first in 86 years.
What it teaches
Moneyball is a story about asking whether the way everyone does something is actually right. Beane did not have more money than his rivals; he had a different question. The film's closing line from him - that it's hard not to be romantic about baseball - is the other half of the lesson: the numbers changed how the game was run, but they did not take the love of it away.
Questions people ask
Is Moneyball based on a true story?
Yes, on Michael Lewis's book Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game (2003) and the real 2002 season of the Oakland Athletics.
Was Peter Brand a real person?
No. Peter Brand is based on Paul DePodesta, Beane's assistant general manager, who did not want his name used in the film.
Did the A's really win 20 games in a row?
Yes. In August and September 2002 the Oakland Athletics won 20 straight games, an American League record at the time; the 20th was won by Scott Hatteberg's walk-off home run.
Did Billy Beane turn down the Red Sox?
Yes. After the 2002 season he accepted and then turned down an offer to become general manager of the Boston Red Sox, as the film shows.
