Randy Lerner

[saunders_heroes]

I don't call paying Charles N'Zogbia 65k a week doing things on the cheap.

And handful of players on PL wages, the rest on peanuts. That's why we had to pack the squad out with crap from the lower leagues and cheap foreigners.
It worked out well don't you think?

[pauliewalnuts]

The way I see it, that system is prone to failure if there is no synergy between the money men and the football men. For example, Veretout's data might be impeccable, but the reality of him gelling within a team that's immediately under pressure of relegation, and which is already trying to integrate many other overseas players like him, may not be practical. It would take a football man (not Sherwood) to know whether it's going to work or not, to advise on the right blend of players, i.e. the team.

But this entire sudden surfacing of people talking about Moneyball (and I don't really know when it stops being a club looking for value and quality across Europe without breaking the bank, like all the other clubs do, and starts being something with a different label and negative connotations) wasn't happening more than a couple of weeks back, it is something which has got people annoyed since Sherwood suggested - against everything he'd previously said - that he didn't pick them.

If he didn't pick them, and he's telling the truth, then I don't suppose they'll have been selected by some sort of algorithm which takes no account of the rest of the players at the squad.

[PeterWithesShin]

Analysing data is sabermetrics, not moneyball.

What's moneyball?

To simplify it as much as possible, signing players that are massively undervalued by other clubs that can do what you highly value. In Billy Beane's case, this was mainly the ability to get on base. It had little to nothing to do with signing a 21 year old full of promise to sell for more later, as highly promising players they weren't undervalued in the first place. He'd sign a 35 year old for a year if he could afford him and he got on base. He used sabermetrics to find these players. It's called moneyball as the Oakland annual budget was say $40m and he was trying to find a way to compete with teams like the Yankees spending $130m a year.

As an example, signing Paul McGrath (considered injured, past it and not wanted by his club) is more 'moneyball' than signing Ashley Young from Watford for a good chunk of money.

[Dave]

No decent manager will come to the club while we run the club on a shoestring, and that is our problem in a nutshell which is 100% down to Randy Lerner in my humble opinion.

So if that's the main problem, how do you account for managers at the likes of Stoke, Swansea, Crystal Palace and (urgh) West Brom all spending less money than us over the last few years and doing considerably better?

Surely as they are being run on even more of a "shoestring" than us then no decent managers are going to want to go to them either?

As Paulie said earlier, we're not being run on anything like the financial footing to be challenging the top six, but we're in no way running on a financial footing to be hanging around the bottom three either.

5+years of cutbacks at this club, our best players sold and replaced by shite not fit to wear the shirt. "Young and hungry" lower league rubbish wrapped up in tinsel hoping the fans will fall for the lies and the slow decline of the club. That's the difference between us and those clubs you mention.

Swansea sold Bony, Allen, and Davies for £28m, £15m and £10m and replaced them with a free transfer, a £5m midfielder from Celtic and a bloke from their youth team.

I wonder if their forums are full of people shouting about lies and the slow decline of their club. So if you could be a bit more specific about the difference - as far as I can see it's the fact that they just spend their small amounts of money a lot better than we spent our small amounts of money.

[saunders_heroes]

No decent manager will come to the club while we run the club on a shoestring, and that is our problem in a nutshell which is 100% down to Randy Lerner in my humble opinion.

So if that's the main problem, how do you account for managers at the likes of Stoke, Swansea, Crystal Palace and (urgh) West Brom all spending less money than us over the last few years and doing considerably better?

Surely as they are being run on even more of a "shoestring" than us then no decent managers are going to want to go to them either?

As Paulie said earlier, we're not being run on anything like the financial footing to be challenging the top six, but we're in no way running on a financial footing to be hanging around the bottom three either.

5+years of cutbacks at this club, our best players sold and replaced by shite not fit to wear the shirt. "Young and hungry" lower league rubbish wrapped up in tinsel hoping the fans will fall for the lies and the slow decline of the club. That's the difference between us and those clubs you mention.

Swansea sold Bony, Allen, and Davies for £28m, £15m and £10m and replaced them with a free transfer, a £5m midfielder from Celtic and a bloke from their youth team.

I wonder if their forums are full of people shouting about lies and the slow decline of their club. So if you could be a bit more specific about the difference - as far as I can see it's the fact that they just spend their small amounts of money a lot better than we spent our small amounts of money.

We've had 5 years of this misery now and you're still blaming the symptoms and not the cause.
Fair enough.

[Malandro]

Perhaps we all have it wrong and its just Fox's pet name for Randy

[pauliewalnuts]

No decent manager will come to the club while we run the club on a shoestring, and that is our problem in a nutshell which is 100% down to Randy Lerner in my humble opinion.

So if that's the main problem, how do you account for managers at the likes of Stoke, Swansea, Crystal Palace and (urgh) West Brom all spending less money than us over the last few years and doing considerably better?

Surely as they are being run on even more of a "shoestring" than us then no decent managers are going to want to go to them either?

As Paulie said earlier, we're not being run on anything like the financial footing to be challenging the top six, but we're in no way running on a financial footing to be hanging around the bottom three either.

5+years of cutbacks at this club, our best players sold and replaced by shite not fit to wear the shirt. "Young and hungry" lower league rubbish wrapped up in tinsel hoping the fans will fall for the lies and the slow decline of the club. That's the difference between us and those clubs you mention.

Swansea sold Bony, Allen, and Davies for £28m, £15m and £10m and replaced them with a free transfer, a £5m midfielder from Celtic and a bloke from their youth team.

I wonder if their forums are full of people shouting about lies and the slow decline of their club. So if you could be a bit more specific about the difference - as far as I can see it's the fact that they just spend their small amounts of money a lot better than we spent our small amounts of money.

We've had 5 years of this misery now and you're still blaming the symptoms and not the cause.
Fair enough.

He's got a point, though, hasn't he?

About Swansea.

[saunders_heroes]

so if Swansea can do it in the cheap, why can't we?
Great.

[Dave]

No decent manager will come to the club while we run the club on a shoestring, and that is our problem in a nutshell which is 100% down to Randy Lerner in my humble opinion.

So if that's the main problem, how do you account for managers at the likes of Stoke, Swansea, Crystal Palace and (urgh) West Brom all spending less money than us over the last few years and doing considerably better?

Surely as they are being run on even more of a "shoestring" than us then no decent managers are going to want to go to them either?

As Paulie said earlier, we're not being run on anything like the financial footing to be challenging the top six, but we're in no way running on a financial footing to be hanging around the bottom three either.

5+years of cutbacks at this club, our best players sold and replaced by shite not fit to wear the shirt. "Young and hungry" lower league rubbish wrapped up in tinsel hoping the fans will fall for the lies and the slow decline of the club. That's the difference between us and those clubs you mention.

Swansea sold Bony, Allen, and Davies for £28m, £15m and £10m and replaced them with a free transfer, a £5m midfielder from Celtic and a bloke from their youth team.

I wonder if their forums are full of people shouting about lies and the slow decline of their club. So if you could be a bit more specific about the difference - as far as I can see it's the fact that they just spend their small amounts of money a lot better than we spent our small amounts of money.

We've had 5 years of this misery now and you're still blaming the symptoms and not the cause.
Fair enough.

So we can assume that you can't really offer any differences between Swansea selling players and replacing them with cheaper ones and Villa selling players and replacing them with cheaper ones then?

[pauliewalnuts]

so if Swansea can do it in the cheap, why can't we?

So you at least accept that if Swansea can do it, it is possible?

[Jimbo]

Analysing data is sabermetrics, not moneyball.

What's moneyball?

To simplify it as much as possible, signing players that are massively undervalued by other clubs that can do what you highly value. In Billy Beane's case, this was mainly the ability to get on base. It had little to nothing to do with signing a 21 year old full of promise to sell for more later, as highly promising players they weren't undervalued in the first place. He'd sign a 35 year old for a year if he could afford him and he got on base. He used sabermetrics to find these players. It's called moneyball as the Oakland annual budget was say $40m and he was trying to find a way to compete with teams like the Yankees spending $130m a year.

As an example, signing Paul McGrath (considered injured, past it and not wanted by his club) is more 'moneyball' than signing Ashley Young from Watford for a good chunk of money.

So, if we're using data analysis to sign players on a budget below that of bigger (or bigger spending) clubs, in order to compete with them, it's moneyball. We've signed younger players with potential (Amavi, Adama), and older players (Lescott). We've done this rather than pay big money on established PL players in their prime. And we have a management system in place to implement it. Looks like moneyball to me, and it's not necessarily a bad thing provided everyone is onside with it.

I struggle to believe the crap that Sherwood comes out with, but if we've an upstairs team signing players to a system, and a manager expected to make them work together as a team, then the relationship between board and manager must be two-way in order for it to work. Which is why it's essential we appoint the right manager.

The truth is, however, we've no idea what's going on.

[Dave]

so if Swansea can do it in the cheap, why can't we?
Great.

It certainly suggests that shouting that you want more money and that nothing else will do apart from more money and if you don't get more money then you'll scream and scream until you are sick isn't necessarily the only way to run a football club.

As lots of better-run ones seem to get by perfectly well doing just that.

[PeterWithesShin]

No, we're trying to sign young talented players just as we and every other club have been for decades.

[pauliewalnuts]

So, if we're using data analysis to sign players on a budget below that of bigger (or bigger spending) clubs, in order to compete with them, it's moneyball.

I genuinely don't get it. How does that differ from what pretty much every other club does?

They all use statistics to scout players. They (very nearly) all have other clubs they are competing with, who have more money than they do.

The word statistics gets used as if it is the only thing they use, ie 'his stats look good, let's get him' without actually scouting them, which I am sure won't be the case.

[Jimbo]

No, we're trying to sign young talented players just as we and every other club have been for decades.

And older players too, chosen by a management structure above the team coach, based on data analysis, and on a tight budget.

It's a slightly different approach to the one we've been taking for decades, and that's why people are talking about moneyball all of a sudden.