Measuring The Oakland A's

Now with the 2012 season in the books after the San Francisco Giants swept past the Detroit Tigers 4-0 for their 7th World Series (2nd in three years and 2nd for the city of SF - the other five were when the Giants were in New York), it gave me a chance to post the following.

Seven straight to close out the post-season for the Giants. Solid performance. So many players - Scutaro, Nomo, Posey, Zito and eventual MVP Sandoval - played to the best of their abilities. Strong pitching and relentless clutch hitting proved to be the key to victory.

***

I finally watched Moneyball the other day. It came years after having read the book.

The Oakland A's are indeed good at finding talent but it hasn't landed them a championship yet.

The Oakland/Philadelphia A's franchise, for the record, is actually one of the most successful in MLB having won 9 titles (third behind the Yankees (27) and St. Louis Cardinals (11)) and 14 appearances (5th overall behind the Yankees (40), Giants (19), Cardinals (18), and Dodgers (18) - Hope I got that right since it's all off the top of my head).

The last time Oakland sniffed a championship up its nose was in 1989.

So. I wondered how have they done in the Moneyball era? Going back to 2000 (which I think is a decent sample size in the modern era) to 2012, here are the average number of wins per season for select clubs:

1) Yankees 96.3 (duh)
2) Cardinals 90.9 (timeless and under rated)
3) Red Sox 89.8 (no surprise)
4) Braves 89.6 (still a solid organization after the golden age of the 1990s)
5) Angels 88.8 (L.A. team not named Dodgers?)
6) Oakland A'S 87.6 (a winning record for Beane and the boys)
7) Phillies 87 (a small surprise)
8) Giants 86.6 (two titles in three years. What if Posey didn't get hurt?)
9) Dodgers 85 (not good enough given its cache and money)
10) White Sox 85.3 (can they keep it up?)
11) Twins 83.5 (usually in the mix - until they play the Yankees)
12) Cubs 80 (sub .500 club. Epstein will bring Moneyball strategies - only he has cash)
13-16) Marlins 79.7,  Astros 78, Tigers 76.3, Rays 74.6 round out the list all below .500.

So the A's stack up well over an arduous 162 game schedule. Real well.

What about the playoffs?

Here's the list of top playoff clubs and their records (not double-checked) ranked by games played:

1) Yankees 52-46
2) Cardinals 50-43
3) Red Sox 34-23
4) Giants 33-22
5) Phillies 27-19
6) Angels 21-24
7) Tigers 20-17 (only team with losing record above to be here)
8) Braves 12-23
9) Oakland A'S 13-19

Rays, Diamond Backs, Twins, Marlins, Cubs, White Sox, Dodgers round out the list with 25 to 15 games played from first to last.

So. The A's are 6th and 9th respectively in regular season and the post season out of 30 teams in Major League Baseball with consistently one of the smallest pay rolls.

Not bad.

Here's a list of teams and their payroll in 2011. The Yankees were first with $202 million and the Royals last with $36 million. The A's were 21st at $66 million. 12 team were over $100 million.