MONEYBALL
5 out of 5 stars

“how can you not get romantic about baseball?” – billy beane

talk about a movie that’ll make you root for the underdog! BRAVO, brad pitt! BRAVO, philip seymour hoffman! aaaaand...i can’t believe i’m saying this...BRAVO, jonah hill! :)

moneyball is based on a true story about how a general manager named billy beane and his protege decide to change the system on how to build one’s team and gain wins using player statistics, not gut instinct. it’s always going to be gamble when it comes to player performance, but sometimes you have to go with what’s concrete and tangible, not instinct... billy beane decides to test out the sabermetric theories of statistician bill james, and the results work. after a devestating loss to the yankees back in 2001, oakland athletics GM (general manager) billy beane (a terrific brad pitt) goes to his owner for more $ to recruit star players, but the owner won’t increase his player salaries budget. so, billy is basically working with pennies here, and he’s having trouble replacing 3 star players, who are now free agents. (i.e. johnny damon, jason giambi, and jason isringhausen) his scouts give him tons of suggestions and potential stars, but while on a business trip in cleveland (at the GM’s office for the cleveland indians), he runs into a young yale graduate named peter brand (jonah hill), who seems to have the ear of the GM, mark shapiro. peter and billy talk in the parking lot, and peter suggests that billy use the sabermetric approach towards building his team again, and billy ponders on it... billy then hires peter as an assistant GM, who starts doing player analysis, building a computer program and such, and they start recruiting! they end up recruiting a “submarine” pitcher named chad bradford (looked over b/c he throws “funny”), former catcher scott hatteberg (looked over for his elbow injury), and former outfielder david justice. (looked over for his age) now, how are they going to convince the head coach to use these guys? i know...trade away the star potentials to force head coach artie howe’s hand! :P

it’s a great movie about a guy who sticks by his values, and decides to take on the system that screwed him over when he was just a fresh HS recruit. EXCELLENT acting and banter between brad pitt and jonah hill!!! both were great, and they really played off of each other wonderfully. you get a good story out of this, but also a glimpse of billy’s past as well. the movie’s central character is obviously billy and how he got to the point of GM and such, but it also gives a good look at the oakland A’s history too. this one really touches the heart of baseball fans. EXCELLENT JOB!!! :)