From Moneyball to the MVP Machine

The announcement by the New York Yankees that the team has selected Matt Blake as its new pitching coach may be the most significant off-season decision that the team will make. Blake replaced Larry Rothschild, a long-time Yankee pitching coach so highly-regarded that he immediately was selected as the San Diego Padres pitching coaching. As the New York Post has presented in this headline, Blake is considered to be "ahead of his time." In the remainder of this article, I will outline why this statement has been made.

https://nypost.com/2019/11/09/yankees-new-pitching-coach-matt-blake-ahead-of-his-time/

Michael Lewis' 2003 book, Moneyball, which eventually became a film of the same name, starring Brad Pitt as Oakland Athletics' General Manager Billy Beane, was one of the important sports books of all time in being a catalyst for a significant shift of focus from scouting and observation-based talent assessment to one based on data. Although some fans underestimate the continuing value of scouting and professional judgment to assess and predict talent development, the more complete and accurate use of data is a welcome addition to scout-based talent assessment.

Some of the less understood implications of the Moneyball philosophy are important in appraising the next generational use of data:

• The Athletics did not have any margin for error, because they had a limited budget. They had to get the best available and complete data on players they drafted and for whom they traded. As a result, Beane had a strong bias for players with several years of college baseball experience, because performance data was more relevant, since he did not have the budget to take a risk on younger players who might not develop as predictably over time. He believed strongly that if he did his job right, what he thought he was getting was what he would get.
• An established player with a particular skill, such as a player with the ability to get on base, had a particular value defined by that skill and the player's limitations. The goal was to spend less money to get a player of relatively predictable value than to spend more and, perhaps, get an unpredictably large return on the player.
• The early 2000's Athletics team assembled a team of players with known skills and limitations. The budget and technology available to make these players far better was so limited that it was not a realistic option. The Athletics could occasionally find a player who would perform better in Oakland because he got a change to play regularly or because the clubhouse environment was better or he got better mentoring from coaches and older player. However, they did not turn players with mediocre skills into superstars by bringing new technology into the coaching and development process.

The 2019 book The MVP Machine: How Baseball's New Nonconformists Are Using Data to Build Better Player by Ben Lindbergh and Travis Sawchik is as important a book as Moneyball in heralding a revolution in baseball and, eventually, in all sports. Lindbergh and Sawchik detailed several stories of players who used advanced technology and coaching analytics to become far better than any scout or past performance data indicated they could be. They focused on players like Trevor Bauer, Max Muncy, Justin Turner, and J.D. Martinez, all of whom became far better as a result of using advanced techniques to rebuild their games from the ground up.

Lindbergh and Sawchik summarized the theme of their book this way:

1. "These new peaks in performance aren’t just the product of better technology. They’re a manifestation of a new philosophy of human potential. Increasingly, teams and players are adopting a growth mindset that rejects long-held beliefs about innate physical talent. One of the only innate qualities may be how hard players are willing to work. Scouts have historically graded players based on five physical tools, but in an era of optimization, a player’s approach to practice is a once-unsung sixth tool that affects the other five."

Matt Blake is a very unusual hire for a Major League team, especially one that operates under a magnifying glass, as is the case with anyone working in the biggest US media market. He has some professional pitching consultative experience, having spent some time helping the Cleveland Indians develop an outstanding starting pitching staff. However, he is notably inexperienced and young, compared with the typical pitching coach hire like Larry Rothschild. Major League pitching coaches average 53 years of age; Blake is 33 years old.

A close reading of his biography would indicate that he is a strong adherent of the philosophy articulated in the Preface to the MVP Machine. He appears to believe that many additional pitchers can be transformed into far better pitchers than their past records would indicate. The Houston Astros did not win the World Championship in 2017 solely because they acquired Justin Verlander in August. This is what mattered as well in their successful run:

• Charlie Morton was 32 years old, and had only one season in which he won more games than he lost (a 7-4 record in 2013). He had a 15-22 record in the three years before the Astros signed him. In 2017, he had a 14-7 record because they worked with him on his mechanics.
• Collin McHugh had a 0-4 record before the Astros acquired him and focused on technology and analytics to turn him into a winner. He was a vital piece of the bullpen with a 5-2 record in 2017 and compiled a record of 54-30 between 2014-2018.
• Brad Peacock had an 11-17 career record before 2017. He had a 13-2 record in 2017.

To some degree, Justin Verlander was also a makeover success. He was 10-8 with the Tigers and 5-0 with the Astros, although, in his case, the success was simply in bringing him back to the level of excellence he had achieved earlier in his career.

The point of these stories is to note that future success may be as much caused by unlocking hidden potential in players than by trading for proven talent. The premium on acquiring proven talent may get too high. The Yankees and other teams that need the scarce commodity of starting talent may find that the solution lies in their organization.

The 2019 Yankees achieved this unlocking of human potential out of necessity, because of injuries. When most of their position player starters went down, they acquired and improved Gio Urshala, Mike Tauchman, and Cameron Maybin. They also promoted Mike Ford and got unanticipated help from him. Luke Voit continued to perform at first base after turning out to be a surprisingly good performer in 2018. Like everyone else, they will need to look internally, as well as externally, for better starting pitching.

We hear a great deal about the "war for talent." I do not believe that there is an inherent talent scarcity, but one that has been artificially created by excessively high credential and experience requirements for jobs. I am rooting for Matt Blake and everyone else who is trying to unlock the hidden potential of players who were not highly regarded. Sports is often a metaphor for life. This particular sports trend is one that matters far more than whether the Yankees and Matt Blake succeed.