The Mets hired Paul DePodesta as their new vice president of player development and amateur scouting, tweets SNY's Brad Como. DePodesta had been working for the Padres since '06. Before that he was the GM of the Dodgers and assistant GM of the Athletics. DePodesta worked under new Mets GM Sandy Alderson in San Diego and under his protege Billy Beane in Oakland. With J.P. Ricciardi already on board, the new Mets front office has a Moneyball feel to it.
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Me likey.
“Hey, the A’s were good in around 2000, we should totally hire their front office!!!”
Considering how much success they had with such a minuscule payroll, imagine how that will translate to a team with as much payroll capacity as the Mets do.
I guess we’ll find out. But, be prepared if we find out that Moneyball doesn’t actually work that great with high-payroll teams.
Yeah, like that scrubby Red Sox organization
I was thinking more along the lines of what we saw with the Seattle Mariners, a more pure approach.
John Lackey, Julio Lugo, Dice-K, etc are not exactly ‘Moneyball’ moves.
I don’t think you can be a “pure” moneyball team and be a big market team at the same time. Assuming you spend like a big market team anyway.
Yea, why would relying on better statistics and drafting well work when you have a lot of money to sign better players.
Why do people think that ‘Moneyball’ is simply about ‘being better’ and ‘using advanced statistics’? Everyone wants to be better. And nowadays, (almost) everyone uses advanced statistics. That’s not the ‘Moneyball’ approach, that’s the general smart person approach.
Moneyball is, and always will be, about finding market inefficiencies and exploiting them, so small-payroll teams can be more on-par with teams that sign your traditional high-salary (but still just as good) players. Advanced statistics were just one example of a market inefficiency back in 2000.
If anything, this front office move is just the Mets catching up to the rest of baseball. I’m looking forward to their organization not being a total embarrassment to the sport. It was getting too easy to make fun of them.
Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see why you can’t have your cake and eat it too.
Did you read Moneyball? do You know what it is? Anything OBP or Saber-related and people wrongly refer to Money ball
That’s why I, or the two posts above mine, weren’t referring to OBP or SABR. It was referring to the Moneyball philosophy that promotes finding market inefficiencies so a small payroll can compete with a larger one.
That philosophy (as we saw with the Mariners) doesn’t apply well to large-payroll teams, otherwise we’d be seeing the Red Sox winning 110+ games every year with ease.
Ok sorry, did not see that one, sorry but I just hate when people say oh thats Moneyball… anyway I just like the fact the Mets have finally gotten people who are for the most part well regarded, rather than having the guy known for trading boat loads of talent for Bartolo Colon and only siging Latino players, true or not that was how Omar was perceived.
Moneyball was all about finding an aspect that was undervalued in the market. At the time of the writing it was OBP and ground ball pitchers. Later Beane switched to defense. The genius of moneyball was in identifying what was valuable and what was overpaid.
Hasn’t it been proven that the success of the A’s was more about the fact they had 3 great pitchers in their prime than anything else?
Woah, look at the A’s drafts 1998-2003, aside from the big 3, there were only a handful of players with a career WAR over 4, Swish, Blanton, and Either being the best, all drafted in 2002/3.
Isn’t that exactly what everyone said about the Mets when they hired Omar Minaya?? Look what he did under that huge payroll after his success in Montreal.
I predict failure with this group as well!!
I counter your argument with the fact that I haven’t gotten the impression that Alderson is a bumbling idiot like I felt about Minaya from interviews, press conferences, etc.
cottster22 must be a philly brave or yankee fan take ur pick….hahahaha
cottster22 must be a philly brave or yankee fan take ur pick….hahahaha
Are you suggesting that a struggling franchise should just continue to hire bad decision makers?
you mean like his debacle with the Dodgers? This is a poor hire, fortunately, Mets fans seem resigned to mediocrity, so this will be no different.
Well…the New York Mets of San Diego are coming along quite well…
And after the last 9 years of front office ridiculousness, I’m OK with that!
Sandy, Sandy, Sandy. The man brings good people with him. There are now pros in charge of the Mets Baseball Operations. Sandy clearly wants to turn the Mets around and this only gives me and other Mets fans HOPE! All three have reason to work their tails off. The Mets will finally be a real team, up and down the line. There are never guarantees, but the Mets will get the talent to compete regularly. Thank God!!!!!
Don’t worry, NL East. The Mets are still owned by Wilpon.
Dammit! Why ya gotta get all realistic on us?!
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Who seem to be finally letting the GM, a very smart man, run the show.
the true test is not the first 30 days….its when things go wrong, and the owners have to exhibit patience. let’s see if paris is still on timeout in 2 years.
although to be fair, the wilpons never allowed any GM to completely revamp the front office and instill their own philosophy ( which contradicts their own ).
this is going to be a severe ( and well-needed ) culture shock for them. hopefully the last 4 seasons have taught them, they are their own worst enemy and they need to just BTFU and let the professionals handle it.
moneyballin’.gif
Good move for the Met’s, they’re finally taking the right steps to becoming competitors every year rather than just signing big names and trying to compete through free agency. If things work out they could be in pretty good shape a few years from now.
Excellent. With JP (great eye for talent), Omar (low cost Latin talent galore), DePodesta (great at developing players and has a good eye for talent), and Sandy (money ball approach with great baseball smarts), I feel like the Mets FO is now one of the best in the league. Hopefully that’ll translate into some winning seasons in 2012 and beyond.
this exact setup with JP heading up scouting in USA, Omar heading up international scouting, and DePodesta heading up development would be an excellent tri-fecta.
terry collins also has been instrumental in the progress that alot of their prospects had this year.
Damn, that’s a good front office now.
Too many cooks in the kitchen…
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KILLJOY WAS HERE!
Doubt it. DePo has voluntarily stayed on as an assistant in San Diego despite opportunities to take another GM job. Ricciardi was going to have to take an assistant’s role to get back into a front office and both of them have worked under Alderson in the past. The only problem I see in this brain trust is who replaces Sandy in the future because he’s not exactly a young man anymore.
*cue Mr. Burns*
EXCELLENT!
Probably the most exciting news I and fellow Met fans will hear all off-season.
Okay.. now to convince Billy Beane he wants to be an assistant GM in NY too.
The NL East could become scary in a couple years. Nationals have a few great prospects and will keep getting early picks and the owner has at least said he’ll spend. Marlins might have the most underrated Front office team in baseball. The Mets will have the resources eventually to turn it around (and could do it faster than a lot of people think imo). And the Braves and Phillies are already 90+ win teams, with recent histories of producing good players from within.
Aldersen is all smoke and mirrors
And you are basing this on…..
GREAT MOVE! now we have one of the best front offices in the game. maybe bring Minaya back as an international scout and bring Grady Fuson in as scouting director now? but with this front office already, i think it’s safe to say:
The New York Mets-2012 NL East Champions
and soon we’ll have one of the best farm systems in the game, watch out MLB.
RE: the Red Sox being a “Moneyball” team. You don’t have to be poor to be on the lookout for market inefficiencies. The Red Sox obtained guys like Billy Wagner and Felipe Lopez because they knew the draft picks they’d get for them is worth far more than the players themselves. The “Moneyball” approach, however one defines it, can absolutely be applicable to big-market teams. It can be a big part of how rich teams can stay rich.
RE: the Red Sox being a “Moneyball” team. You don’t have to be poor to be on the lookout for market inefficiencies. The Red Sox obtained guys like Billy Wagner and Felipe Lopez because they knew the draft picks they’d get for them is worth far more than the players themselves. The “Moneyball” approach, however one defines it, can absolutely be applicable to big-market teams. It can be a big part of how rich teams can stay rich.
DePo deserves another shot at being a GM. He made some mistakes with the Dodgers but maybe had he stayed and been able to apply the moneyball philosophy to keep the payroll down McCourt wouldn’t have raised the ticket prices (as much).
DePo ruined (and I mean ruined) the Dodgers…he has no EYE for talent…he didn’t play the game…I was so glad he left (even Coletti..who sucks…is better)…I feel sorry for the die hard Mets fans.
That is absolute madness.
The Mets are a “believe it when I see it” franchise. They have failed so much as an organization that it is hard to think they aren’t cursed.
i’ve had the idea they are cursed since 07. this idea was confirmed when castillo dropped that pop-up in 09.
Maybe a Moneyball sequel will be about the Mets.