VCTOR BUENO ABAD

MONEYBALL
BUSINESS FINAL PROJECT
Monografa

Abstract
In this essay I am going to talk about certain aspects
of the movie Moneyball related with learning from
failure. But before talking specially about learning
from failure I want to talk about in what consists this
movie. Also I would like to talk about the five topics I
could choose at first, and why did I choose learning
from failure. Therefore, I will explain all of the five
topics and say briefly why they are as a choice in
this work, but the topics that are the ones I havent
choose I will only explained it in a general form.
Then, I will focus in Learning from failure in this
movie and I will compare it with the characters of
the movie. Also I want to mention briefly in this
abstract after entering into the essay that learning
from failure is not only implicated in the principal
character or in the basic / general theme of the
movie, it is also implicated in many characters, and
inside mostly each character that appears in the
movie we can see and learn and comprehend an
history that makes us learn how he feels at certain
moments of the movie, one of the characters I am
talking about is named Scott. It is not the principal
character, neither the second, forms part of the
team in which this movie moves around, where
many players are, but he, as many others, is a great
and mostly perfect example of learning from failure,
of never surrender and of going across moments in
which someone feels bad and he does something to
do not feel like that anymore. Now, I would start my
essay based on learning from failure.

Contents Page
Introduction: A brief resume about what happens in
Moneyball and the importance of some characters.

Body: A brief explanation of how all the topics I

could choose are related to this movie and a deep
explanation of learning from failure and superation
in the characters of the movie and how these things
relate with each other.

Conclusion: A short conclusion giving importance to

the values that gives Moneyball movie and project
to the people and to baseball.

Introduction
I am going to introduce this essay by making a
resume of Moneyball, then I will start to explain all
the points I want to talk about and to link some
points with others. Obviously, mostly all the
important points will be about learning from failure,
but that wont be all. Like I said in the abstract, I will
explain briefly others options I could choose instead
of Learning from failure.
The movie starts focusing in a baseball team named
the Oakland Athletics. They lost an important match
and that suppose a deception for a team of reduced
money compared with the opponents team. Then is
when we met for the first time Billy Beane. He is the
manager of the Oakland Athletics and he is trying to
obtain some money to buy new players for his
baseball team. Their best players are being
transfered to other more important teams and he
has to receive some money so the team can afford
the high prices of buying new players. He does not
obtain the money he needs and he finally decides to
obtain what he can. Then, he meets someone called
Peter Brand. When Billy hears the way of thinking of
Peter he immediately offers him a place in his team.
This new way of thinking is named MoneyBall, is
related with code, statistics, and probabilities. With

it, they discover some players at a very lower cost

because they are underestimated. They form a new
team with the bases of Moneyball, but the coach did
not want to put at the beginning of the game the
new players because he said that that ones couldnt
play at certain positions or that someone was better
than them, etc One of the players names Scott
Hatteberg and he has bad his arm so he cannot play
well baseball at certain aspects, but as Bradford,
another player that buyed Billy, they were the ones
chosen to be played because they did one thing
very well. Finally, Billy saw that the coach didnt
want to put the ones that wanted Billy, so what he
did was sell all the players that wanted the coach so
he has not another choice except letting play at the
beginning players like Scott and Bradford. When he
did that they Moneyball theory began to succed and
they finally won twenty games consequently. This, is
a resume of what happened in the Moneyball movie.

Body
Now I want to talk about the five choices I had for
doing this work and why I had chosen this one. The
five choices are: Big Data, Strategy, Human
Resources, Learning from failure and Innovation.
When I had to choose the one that I did not like was
Human resources. When I watch the movie, I
understood certain aspects of all the five topics
except from human resources because it did not

interest me. Big Data has a very important role in

this movie because is the one that they used to
make the Moneyball theory, Strategy is very clear in
this movie when, for example, Billy sells all the
players that use the coach so he uses the ones Billy
wants to use, about Learning from failure I will talk
about later because is the most important, and
finally, all the Moneyball project is an innovation.

Well, now I am going to talk about all the important

things: Learning from failure. All the movie turns
around learning from failure, at the beginning, Billy
learns that they are not focusing in what is the real
problem, because he has learned about other times
that they always focus only in a short part of the
problem. Learning that, he is capable to focus in the
real problem and to continue with his strategy to
form a good team. That is only one of the many
examples that are in this movie, I would like to
explain you the principal ones. Another character
that I mentioned before in the introduction is named
Scott Hatteberg, he has passed bad moments
because of his arm and Billy wants him for his team.
At first Scott has no confidence in himself, but then,
when he starts to play he begins to gain confidence
and he finally forgets that fear he felt when a ball
came to him and is the one that transform the
nineteen wins in twenty wins consequently, making
him in a symbol of superation and learning from
failure. Another learning from failure that is related
with strategy is when Billy continually tries to

convince the coach that Hatteberg, Bradford, etc

have to play and he never gets convinced.
Therefore, he finally learns that he is never going to
do what Billy wants. So he sells all the players in
who the coach trusted, so he couldnt make they
play and they would play all the players that Billy
wanted.

Conclusion
I totally recommend this movie and is a very good
example of what my point to talk about was. All that
learning from failure related with many characters,
that supperation of also many related characters.
That conviction in what they were doing Billy and
Peter that made them continue without hearing
what they said about it. No one trusted in that
method, everyone thought that they were going to
fail and make the team sink into deep waters, but
what they did is elevate the team into a great
position and change the manner of thinking and
playing in baseball.

References and bibliography

- Moneyball (movie 2011)
- The Real Lessons of Moneyball (by Justin Fox)

Appendices
-

Title page: page 1

Abstract: page 2
Contents page: page 3
Introduction: pages 4 and 5
Body: pages 5 and 6
Conclusion: pages 6 and 7
References & Bibliography: page 7
Appendices: page 7