Latest Takeover Rumour. The Moores / Noell one

[USABlue]

Montpellier won the league 3 years back with one of the smallest budgets in the country, tbf.

The point remains that relegation absoloutly changes the way a sporting owner has to think. What is successful techniques in a sporting league in america will not work in a league with relegation, no salary gap and no restraints on buying players.

Any american owner will have to adjust their way of thinking or they won't succeed here.

Oh without a doubt you have to alter your thinking, I must have missed most of the argument tbh. I was just responding to parity within the leagues haha wasn't talking about ownership styles. That being said this whole moneyball thing is being blown out of proportion

 

[SerenityNigh]

What is successful techniques in a sporting league in america will not work in a league with relegation, no salary gap and no restraints on buying players.

Disappointed to read this, because what you write is generally very astute.

 

[USABlue]

Can't see any argument that the PL has more parity/competition than American sports. In 23 years you've had 5 clubs win the title: United (13), Chelsea (4), Arsenal (3), City (2), and Blackburn. The NBA--which has the least parity of the NA sports--has seen 8 clubs win the title in that same span: Lakers (5), Spurs (5), Bulls (3), Heat (3), Celtics, Mavericks, Pistons, Warriors.

Maybe if you want to extend back another 23 or 46 years you'll find more parity among top-flight English football, but at this point the question becomes absurd because you're comparing entirely different structures.

A much more coherent and succinct response than mine

 

[Allezfan]

Can't see any argument that the PL has more parity/competition than American sports. In 23 years you've had 5 clubs win the title: United (13), Chelsea (4), Arsenal (3), City (2), and Blackburn. The NBA--which has the least parity of the NA sports--has seen 8 clubs win the title in that same span: Lakers (5), Spurs (5), Bulls (3), Heat (3), Celtics, Mavericks, Pistons, Warriors.

Maybe if you want to extend back another 23 or 46 years you'll find more parity among top-flight English football, but at this point the question becomes absurd because you're comparing entirely different structures.

Parity among the elite franchises of the league, sure. I was defending the use of the word cartel which is a description of when a bunch of 'competing' buisnesses agree fixed rules that will see them all profit but rule out any new company or company outside of the cartel from growing into the marketplace.

That seems to me an accurate description of a closed off league with agreed financial rules that mean any member of that closed off league can win it.

 

[SerenityNigh]

Parity among the elite franchises of the league, sure. I was defending the use of thweword cartel which is a description of when a bunch of 'competing' buisnesses agree fixed rules that will see them all profit but rule out any new company or company outside of the cartel from growing into the marketplace.

That seems to me an accurate description of a closed off league with agreed financial rules that mean any member of that closed off league can win it.

Won't disagree with this, but still much to learn from what works in other systems/leagues, and I disagree entirely with the conflation of "cartel" and "moneyball". Beane's basic premise (in my oversimplified terms) is that certain players who "have the look about them" or excel in one statistical category (i.e., BA) have much higher prices than those who don't have the look (but do produce), or excel in under-valued categories (W, OBP). These undesired players may not have the same upside, but they have better value overall. No doubt Beane got lucky with a few players as WM suggested, but he also picked out great players that nobody else was looking for. Much more opportunity for this in football, with leagues all over the world, than in baseball with a relatively limited talent pool.

Not all leagues are the same--baseball and basketball, despite having very similar "cartel" structures, produce very different results in how to select young talent--but I think there's still much for English football clubs to learn about how to select and acquire talent.

 

[kithnou]

Who's this Moneyball bloke getting all this coverage in here?
Is he heading a second interested consortium?

 

[Moomin]

It's amazing these American guys have told employees in the US and Ireland but not yet told the press.

 

[Groucho]

It was only 1987 when relegation from the football league was intoduced, tbf. Before then you could stay up as long as you won an election with the other clubs voting. I'm pretty glad that's gone away.

Sorry mate I meant for the PL.

The PL clubs all voted against no relegation around 2013.

 

[roydo]

-but I think there's still much for English football clubs to learn about how to select and acquire talent.

In danger of veering off topic, but it is sort of possibly relevant to the thread.

I think English football clubs are very good at scouting and getting young players. The problem is the development of said talent. Football, although OPTA Stats and others will deny it, is rarely a statistical based sport. Sure, it will tell you who ran how far and who scored more goals in the final 5 minutes of games. But the top clubs are not interested in developing players. Well they are, in that they want to have as many as possible in case they miss someone, but their managers, on a 2 year deal, arent.

Off the shelf, developed players is their way. In the main.

 

[abelard]

I disagree entirely with the conflation of "cartel" and "moneyball"

Nobody is conflating "Moneyball" with "Cartel." The point is that analytical approaches where the majority of expenses are publicly subsidized, where collusion to dampen player wages is routine, where revenues are pooled, and where ineptitude is rewarded - in other words, where it's impossible not to profit - don't apply to the rest of the world. This was in response to whether or not the San Diego Padres have anything to do with how Everton might be run. Smart sports management in the US is often deliberately reducing performance standards in order to be arbitrarily compensated with controllable assets at artificially low prices. American fans even want their teams to take this approach! I'm not trying to be anti-American, just to point out that running a team in that environment is... exceptional, and the record shows it rarely (ever?) works in a more free market system, like the rest of the world uses. Successful US premier league owners, anyone? The main point isn't to bash Americans, but that the "it must be Kenwright's fault I was still a virgin after high-school" crowd should be careful what they wish for, with all foreign ownership bids, but American ones in particular.

If we're going to define Moneyball as just "buy low sell high" then it's a useless platitude that nobody could possibly object to. The problem is that how you go about it in such an exceptional environment is very different than it is in a more free market system, and the result so far suggest the transition is not so straight-forward to overcome

 

[neil999]

moneyball sounds like we have to sign ugly or strange players

 

[abelard]

Can we please stop with the "Moneyball" translations, because they're getting further and further off point. This point above makes no sense. "Cartels" try to restrict competition. The financial rules in American sports, such as salary caps and other spending restrictions that aren't in place in most football leagues, were created with the sole intent of creating parity, or equal opportunities for all teams to compete at the same level, both financially and on the field.

Cartels in the business sense, not in the "all the teams are equally above average" on the playing field sense. As you outline above, it's difficult to think of a more textbook example of a cartel than American sports franchises (again, in the business sense).

 

[SerenityNigh]

In danger of veering off topic, but it is sort of possibly relevant to the thread.

I think English football clubs are very good at scouting and getting young players. The problem is the development of said talent. Football, although OPTA Stats and others will deny it, is rarely a statistical based sport. Sure, it will tell you who ran how far and who scored more goals in the final 5 minutes of games. But the top clubs are not interested in developing players. Well they are, in that they want to have as many as possible in case they miss someone, but their managers, on a 2 year deal, arent.

Off the shelf, developed players is their way. In the main.

Fair points; I agree that this conversation veers pretty far from the topic, but until £25M signings are once-a-window and not once-a-generation, we might agree that Everton are more like Beane's A's than most other clubs we can compare, hence the attention to finding/developing value where others don't (as the club has shown it can.)

 

[SerenityNigh]

moneyball sounds like we have to sign ugly or strange players

Wouldn't mind a 12-fingered GK, does that count?

 

[wm02]

Cartels in the business sense, not in the "all the teams are equally above average" on the playing field sense. As you outline above, it's difficult to think of a more textbook example of a cartel than American sports franchises (again, in the business sense).

Yup. And they've received antitrust exemptions to maintain this status in perpetuity