Quote:
Originally Posted by Uncle Peter
This season was always going to a dip into untested waters for the club. Such a massive upheaval in the playing staff was a risky gamble as was the moneyball style transfer strategy thus placing boundaries on players who may be selected as transfer targets.
|
There is no apparent application of Moneyball principles in Liverpool's transfer strategy. This appears to be a myth born of the fact that their owners applied Moneyball to the Boston Red Sox. However, they do not appear to have applied it at Liverpool.
Moneyball isn't so easily applied to Football anyway. The concept of Moneyball is to get value by carefully analysing statistics on players, '
Sabermetrics', and buying players that offer the best value per measurable quality. This was an easier revolution in Baseball as their statistics are easier to measure because the play is much less fluid. You throw the ball, you hit it, you get on base, you score a run if you can. The play goes again. Each part extremely measurable, with little team dynamics effecting the runner or the person on bat. It was also a bigger revolution in a sport which neglected such statistics for a long time.
Football has long used statistics such as ProZone and did take on board Moneyball principles when they spotted them emerging from Oakland 10 years ago. However football is a lot harder to measure. You can measure assists but that can vary greatly depending upon the pattern of play, the way the team is set up, and the striker they served. You can measure goals but, again, goals can vary widely depending on the set up of the team. A team may be all out attack or funnel their play via a single striker. Last season Arsenal were the former, depending on many players providing goals and assists with players cutting in from the flanks. Doesn't mean Van Persie was rubbish last season. Equally how do effectively measure the impact of full backs or a defensive midfielder? How do you measure a creative playmaker like Xavi?
No, Football finds the application of Moneyball style principles far more difficult. There are a lot of clever people trying and, were possible, ProZone is applied to measure fatigue levels, running speeds, when to time impact subs and when to take them off.
Liverpool are not applying Moneyball principles. It's just a myth. They have done the opposite. Paying over the odds for ineffective players based on their hype and/or form, buying them because they look good. £35 million for Carroll after 6 to 8 months of good form for example. That is actually the antithesis of Moneyball which was designed to find hidden value in unlikely places . Newcastle have a far better claim when it comes to getting value out of the transfer market.