I read an interesting article today about one of the consequences of the Moneyball/sabermetrics revolution. The free agent market for average and marginal players has dried up. GM’s have figured out that the veterans with mediocre production do not warrant the kind of money they used to get. Instead, they find that many of their Triple-A players can be brought up to produce at that level, leaving them with more flexibility to sign the really good and star players. I used to wonder all the time why teams spent so much money on re-tread players. Now they’re less inclined to do so. The difference makers will still get the outrageous contracts, but everyone else is being left to sign small deals with incentives for much shorter terms. The math shows that the real talent is rare and worth more than ever, but just having experience at logging at-bats or innings won’t get you where it used to.
Also, I enjoyed Moneyball. Like most sports movies I thought it was somewhat misleading and over-simplified things, but the movie was well done and enjoyable.
S
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