The Dodgers are going nuts with the money lately, and I'm curious as to what your opinions are as to why DePodesta is resorting to Yankee-like spending when his mentor/boss for six years in Billy Beane was so opposed to that (and he saw great success with that formula)... you figure, Paul was such a big component of the A's success, why would he want to change the formula now? With the signing of Rob Lowe now (for a ridiculous amount of money) it really does seem like he's going overboard...


Now I realize it's a different place as far as money is concerned in that the Dodgers actually have a lot to spend... but what are your opinions on why exactly Paul has gone nuts lately? Billy must be rolling his eyes ad nausium these days

Beane was not "opposed" to spending big money on players. His strategy was based on the the resources available to him.

Don't forget, the A's offered Giambi $90 million over six years to stay, which he would have taken if they'd have granted him a no-trade clause - so it's not like they're completely against giving out a big contract.

As for Depodesta, it could be that he's in over his head, and he doesn't have the ability to negotiate with a shark like Boras.

lowe = best off-season pick-up......you heard it here

Dude, they're the freaking LA Dodgers. They should have one of the top 3 payrolls in MLB every year. They have the resources and fanbase to support it.

Lowe in LA is a good fit. If any park can aid his success, it's Chavez Ravine.

Depodesta was given a complete disaster of a roster to work with. Dreifort, Hundley, Green...yikes.
And yeah, Beane's not opposed to spending money, his boss won't allow him to spend money.

I guess "opposed to" would be the wrong wording, but I guess I expected Paul to be more conservative with his money coming from a place where it's been shown that money does not equal success at all... I figured he'd look for the good buys instead of throwing money out there... of course he's going to spend it since he has more to work with, but just because the Dodgers have the money to spend doesn't mean every big name they sign was a good decision


And for the record I don't think Lowe will do well in LA... it's a pitcher's park, sure... but one postseason won't make me forget his horrific regular season last year... "The tragickal Mr. Lowe," as Stephen King would put it

I agree with ya.

He's probably under a lot of pressure to DO SOMETHING though. His biggest mistake was letting Beltre walk.

umm, isn't their payroll lower now than it was last year? Or at least very similar?

ok here it goes...I am the BIGGEST dodger fan you will ever find....and let me tell you, 99% of us want Depodesta to just up and fucking die. He is a billy bean butt boy who thinks this nerdy assfuck MONEYBALL system of building a team is the way to go.

First, you should know that Frank McCourt, the dodgers owner, is BROKE. He paid for the team thru loans from Fox Corp. and from financial partners. Therefor the Dodgers have NO MONEY to spend like the Yankees do.

The Dodger payroll was 11 mill last year, and McCourt REFUSED To let it go higher than that. IF you really look the LA payroll is now around 98 million.

Now as for Depodesta, he is a fucking asshole. He has gutted every single player true dodger fans cared about and rooted for in favor of losers like JD Drew and Jeff Kent, preaching his nerdy assfuck stats like OPS and OBP.....There isnt ONE player left on that team I would ever pay to see or turn on my tv to watch. All of the REAL dodgers are gone, and Depo has turned my beloved Dodgers into a collection of losers who wont be better than 3rd in the west in 2005.

dude, Lowe is a sinker baller who on the 2004 dodgers who had the best infield defense in the game would have been a 20 game winner.....on the 2005 dodgers he will be pure shit. Jose Valentin, Jeff Kent and Hee Sop Choi may be the worst infield ever assembled. Fuck Depodesta

I don't fault him when he let beltre go, I can see giving that guy so much money for one good year, That move will pay off, as beltre will be shit next year

i hope so

anyone who watched Beltre play frm the 2nd half of 2003 thru last year could see he had become an absolute clutch superstar worthy of the money he got.

Beltre was asking for $65mill for 6 years and Depo didnt even make an offer, but he gave JD DRew who is an injury prone loser $55 million???

so the Dodgers couldnt afford an extra 10 million for a homegrown 25yr old gold glove superstar who the fans loved? Depo is a fucking loser who has no business running a team

sorry lukin, with that collection of losers in the infield, Lowe will not win 12 games this year.

AND he took EK's #23 so I just hate him even more now

The main reason I brought this point up was because I thought something was out of place... it seems like DePodesta seems tailored to teams where he has to scrap for players and use the numbers to do so... letting Beltre walk (arguably the NL MVP last year) was a dumb move and it seems like he was let go just because he wasn't one of DePo's "guys"...


Moves like buying guys like Jeff Kent just seem uncharacteristic to me... big money guys (Kent isn't that big of money, but for Depo, I'd argue he is) aren't a good idea by any means for a system he seems to be meshing with others... he was a great go-to guy for Beane but I don't see how he's going to work things out here... seems like the wrong market for him

Yeah just like the Jets are going to win on Saturday

I agree parchy....the thing is, McCourt KNEW he wasnt going to have the resources to spend yankee money and hired Depo because he studied Moneyball under Bean all those years....

my question is when did the game of baseball stop being a game for men and became a game for geeky nerds with computers and math degrees?

i mean, what the fuck is OPS?????? what is that? and do you think in the 40s managers sat around discussing Joe Dimaggios on base percentage??

Ill take a 240 hitter who drives in 120 runs any damn day over some slap hitter who hits .300 and has a high on base %.....if no one is SCORING who the fuck cares how many times these players get on base??

and what has Moneyball won in Oakland? NOTHING. what, a few playoff appearences with NO series wins? Moenyball is WORTHLESS

Michael Lewis hates you

did you even read Moneyball? It is NOT about focusing on players high OPS. It's about finding inefficiencies in markets and exploiting them.

Also, valuing on base percentage is NOT A NEW CONCEPT! The first thing they teach you in little league is "a walk is just as good as a hit".

I agree Beane is overrated (mostly due to the book - which he didn't write), but he must get at least SOME credit for building a team that has had as much success as Oakland has despite their low payroll.

I don't get why you're all hung up on criticizing OPS. It's simply a quick and easy way to see how effective a guy is as an offensive player. It's not like Depodesta, Ricciardi, and all the other stat guys sit around all day talking about it. It certainly tells you much more about a batter than batting average and RBI's.

Batting average especially is probably the most overrated stat that we have


And a lot of the "Moneyball" ideas about fielding and such are pretty revolutionary (might as well just call them James' ideas).... this is probably my favorite piece from the book:

"As Bill James had shown, baseball data conflated luck and skill, and simply ignored a lot of what happened during a baseball game. With two outs and a runner on second base a pitcher makes a great pitch: the batter hits a bloop into left field that would have been caught had the left fielder not been Albert Belle. The shrewd runner at second base, knowing that Albert Belle is slow not just to the ball but also to the plate, beats the throw home. In the record books the batter was credited with having succeeded, the pitcher with having failed, and the left fielder and the runner with having been present on the scene. This was a grotesque failure of justice. The pitcher and runner deserved to have their accounts credited, the batter and the left fielder to have theirs debited (the former should have popped out; the latter somehow had avoided committing an "error" and at the same time put runs on the board for the other team).

Theo Epstein uses the same methods to evaluate players. How would you evaluate HIS performance so far?