Moneyball by Michael Lewis Reading Log 9

The Trading Desk
The chapter begins by discussing Mike Magnante and his struggling performance from the last few games. He constantly is giving up more runs, hits, and homeruns. The Oakland Athletics decide they would like to trade him. This is where Billy Beane comes in to play. Billy is the one who regulates the trading cycle for the Oakland Athletics. Oakland is deciding to trade their players for better players because they are close to winning to division, so Billy Beane thinks its time to trade players. He has five rules for trading players. One rule is that change is always good and you have to go with short term solutions instead of long term solutions if you are a poor baseball team like Oakland. Another rule is the day you make a requirement for something you are not going to have much success because you will spend too much on that player. You have to know how much the player is worth as well. Also, every team should know what player they want and go after him. The final rule is that you will have to deal with public scrutiny from the media and you have to do your best to ignore their unnecessary comments. Throughout the stories, the Oakland Athletics are trying to trade with multiple teams such as the New York Mets, Boston Red Sox, San Francisco Giants, and the Los Angeles Dodgers.  Billy regulates the entire trading desk and does what is best for the Athletics in this chapter.

I found this chapter quite boring because it was only about  trading and money. The trading desk seems like a boring process and completely aggravating. An interesting fact was that my friend's name appeared in this chapter a lot. The players discussed and the whole process is quite simple the way the described it. I was fairly educated on this topic before I read the chapter which may have been another reason I refer to it as boring. I really hope this book does not have any more boring chapters!

Moneyball by Michael Lewis Reading Log 8

Scott Hatteberg, Pickin' Machine
This chapter discusses the unique qualities of Scott Hatteberg. After he has been drafted, Hatteberg goes to train with the A's fielding coach. The A's fielding coach will make the players want to play better without even saying it. He trains with him for a while and Hatteberg is absolutely terrible, but there is slight improvement every time he practices. Eventually, he becomes a started in the Oakland Athletic line-up. His unique quality is how he judges which balls to hit. Hatteberg never swings at the first pitch and analyzes the pitcher to determine how is he going to hit. The Boston Red Sox, the team that was drafted by, hated his approach and gave him to Athletics. The Athletics loved his approach and would always tell them "Way to approach the ball" and this was environment Hatteberg was not used to. He would expose the pitchers weaknesses which would help the other batters. After the pitcher was done pitching to Hatteberg, their weakness had been exposed. This chapter determines Scott Hatteberg as one of the hitters with the best analysis of the game.
My perspective on this chapter was that it was quite interesting. This player is extremely patient and chill when he is in the batter's box, when most hitters want to smash the ball to hit a home run. Hatteberg is one of those players that the author is trying to emphasize. The author may want to show that patience is key to success and I would totally agree with that perspective.

Teenage Driving:http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/03/teenagers-friends-and-bad-decisions/?src=me&ref=general

This article does not make any sense. They tested the teenage drivers on a video game! Honestly, when you are playing a video game of course you do not care about the safety regulations. Safety is not an issue when you are supposed to be having fun with your friends. Competition does rise when there are friends to play with in a game but that does not affect how they drive. I do not agree with this article because the test does not have an actual effect of real life.

Super Bowl XLV

PACKERS WIN SUPER BOWL XLV!!!! Aaron Rodgers played excellent today and I am glad the Packers won. Aaron Rodgers just received something that Brett Favre never did which is a super bowl ring! Favre must be so jealous right now. It was a pretty good game in the second half, but it was a complete and utter blow out in the first. Good job Packers, you really deserved it tonight!

Halftime Show

The groups selected for the halftime show were good such as the Black Eyed Peas, Slash, and Usher. Although the band selection was good, the Black eyed peas performed terribly in their first few songs. They did get better as it progressed. Usher was excellent and so was Slash. I hope they start picking better and more recent music groups like they did tonight.

Manchester United Loses!

The good part about football today is that Manchester United finally lost! They lost to the wolves which are the worst team in the english premier league. They are at the bottom of the charts and beat the so called number 1 team with a score of 2-1. I absolutely hate Manchester United especially Wayne Rooney. Word can not describe my hate for Wayne Rooney!

Newcastle United vs. Arsenal

I can't believe that Arsenal tied with Newcastle! They had a 4 goal lead going into the half and 3 of those goals were scored within the first 10 minutes of the match. I am very dissapointed to see them give up what should have been a victory. The only reason they tied was because of the referee making the worst calls. He gave them two penalty kicks and a free kick that were obviously faked by newcastle united. I hope Arsenal will do much better in their next game!