🚀 The Book in 3 Sentences

1. Lindbergh and Miller, who are baseball writers, bring a sabermetric (advanced statistics) approach to building and fielding an independent professional baseball team in Sonoma, California.
2. As Lindbergh and Miller attempt to bring new ideas to a sport entrenched in old beliefs they are met with resistance and continually experiment with various ways to have the manager and team members adopt their unorthodox strategies.
3. While seeing how the experiment ultimately turns out (spoiler alert: great in the first half of the season, not so much in the second half) is the main storyline, following the individual players and their fight to make it in the sport is what keeps you engaged throughout.

🎨 Impressions

I was a bit skeptical as I picked this book up as I'm not a devotee to sabermetrics in baseball. I think it's an interesting idea but I guess deep down I was part of the "old guard" in baseball that thinks advanced analytics may be playing a bit of a heavy hand in the game. That or I just hated getting shifted as a left-handed hitter.

My initial hesitations were assuaged as I started reading though as the book is more about team dynamics and the personal stories of the characters and less about how statistics could influence the direction of the team (though there is plenty of stats to get your fix if that's what you enjoy!).

How I Discovered It

Reddit recommendation of "best baseball books to read."

Who Should Read It?

Baseball fans who are interested in how sabermetric experiments play out in the real world.

Outside of baseball fans, I think anyone who is interested in team dynamics or how to bring new ideas into an organization entrenched in old beliefs would enjoy this book.

☘️ How the Book Changed Me

How my life / behavior / thoughts / ideas have changed as a result of reading the book.

• Putting Theory to the Test: This book is a masterclass of how an academic (Ben and Sam in this case) can put a theory (Sabermetrics) into practice. There is likely no better experiment than trying to bring new ideas to a sport like baseball, that is entrenched in old beliefs. I saw parallels with trying to bring a new technology to customers - people have to see results to believe in the idea.
• Finding Outliers: The premise of Lindbergh and Miller's experiment is that by using a statistic based approach, they can find players that MLB scouts passed over. I found it interesting that they could build a team from a spreadsheet without having seen any of them play in real-life. Stats don't tell the whole story, but can definitely be used as a filter to identify players.
• Outsider Mentality: The constant struggle throughout the book is how Ben and Sam ("statsheads") integrate within the team and organization. Ben and Sam are "outsiders" to the baseball world, having not played past youth baseball, but ultimately the team begins to trust their opinion on strategies and preparation. Many parallels in how outsiders try to disrupt any type of social organization.

✍️ My Top 3 Quotes

• "By night, he wastes time working for us, joining a long line of supersmart people who might have cured cancer if they’d never come across a dumb game in which grown-ups hit cowskin with sticks."
• "At one point in a preseason meeting with Fehlandt, when the conversation turned to the shittiness of umpires, our manager said something that stuck with me: “I try to explain, dude, this is my résumé. Put yourself in our perspective and understand how important this is. I need to see you work as hard as me.” Before we ask the players to trust us, we need them to see how hard we’re trying."
• "Because, I come to realize, losing is not only the absence of victory but also the expenditure of an opportunity for victory."

📒 Summary, Highlights, and Notes

Kindle Highlights

There were no rules, except for one that our players demanded: Whatever we tried had to work.

Location: 138

By night, he wastes time working for us, joining a long line of supersmart people who might have cured cancer if they’d never come across a dumb game in which grown-ups hit cowskin with sticks.

Location: 630

being competitive means engaging in the ambiguous negotiation of the acceptable vs. the unacceptable.

Location: 824

If the A’s were “a collection of misfit toys,” as Michael Lewis wrote, then we’ll be building a team out of toys that got recalled because they were choke hazards.

Location: 947

The first rule of child psychology is that it applies throughout all of life. They will scoff at it and three days later be checking out how many stars they have.

Location: 1220

They exist for history, and we take joy from them because we accept that they are superior at an arbitrary assortment of skills that we have collectively decided have value.

Location: 1238

At one point in a preseason meeting with Fehlandt, when the conversation turned to the shittiness of umpires, our manager said something that stuck with me: “I try to explain, dude, this is my résumé. Put yourself in our perspective and understand how important this is. I need to see you work as hard as me.” Before we ask the players to trust us, we need them to see how hard we’re trying.

Location: 1441

But he had also committed the cardinal sin of ballplayers: He wouldn’t shut the fuck up.

Location: 1518

SA Note: This couldn't be more true inside of a clubhouse/team.

We’ve seen Kristian’s bat commit murder-suicide,

Location: 2143

SA Note: I like this reference to a broken bat home run.

We were like third-party candidates whose positions could never be proven wrong, until by fluke of circumstance we accidentally got elected.

Location: 2856

Once I started trying to win an argument, I found myself rotating every fact to suit my position. This was true of the facts that came out of my mouth and also of facts that went into my ears, which I heard only deeply enough to deflate or reposition. Conversation became an exercise in bullshit.

Location: 3744

Its premise, based on the work of political scientists, was that the worst thing a president can do to advance his positions is to state them; as soon as he does, a huge number of people will position themselves in opposition, and they will lose the ability to be swayed by any contradictory evidence.

Location: 3747

Dale Carnegie was way ahead of me: “If you tell them they are wrong,” he wrote, “do you make them want to agree with you? Never! For you have struck a direct blow at their intelligence, judgment, pride and self-respect. That will make them want to strike back. But it will never make them want to change their minds. If you are going to prove anything, do it so subtly that no one will feel that you are doing it.”

Location: 3754

Because, I come to realize, losing is not only the absence of victory but also the expenditure of an opportunity for victory.

Location: 4744

The timing of the Stompers’ first title lends itself to one of two interpretations: that Sam and I had been holding the team back, or that Sam and I had set up the team for its subsequent success. I’m not sure there’s that much truth to either.

Location: 5782

SA Note: As someone who has had 3(!) separate teams that won a title or advanced to the post-season right after my departure (HS, College, and Summer Collegiate teams), I often think about this sentiment a lot. Selfish-me says that I helped set these teams up for success, while the "glass half-empty" side of me says that I was holding them back. Like Lindbergh says, there probably isn't much truth to either.