“If he’s a good hitter than why doesn’t he hit good?” 😂 I love that line! Awesome movie!

The Hatteberg home run happened just as the film showed. That almost too perfect timing of Billy offering him the contract at Christmas time was accurate, too-it happened on December 22nd. He played in the majors until mid-season 2008. He still works for the front office in Oakland.

"When your enemies are making mistakes, don't interrupt them." Is a line I say all the time.

"He hit a home run and he didn't even realize it." This film actually changed my life. Specifically the scene when Peter shows Billy the footage of the guy hitting the home run and not knowing it. At the time, I was living in Oregon. I had moved there and it was my first time living on my own away from home. I was trying something totally different and taking a chance. I lived there for over a year and I liked it a lot there but, for several reasons, it wasn't working out. I wanted to leave Oregon but I was afraid that by doing so I would be giving up. I was afraid of being seen as a failure and feeling like a failure. I felt I didn't succeed in my hopes and goals. But then I saw Moneyball and I decided to move and I saw everything in all that in a different way. The film made me realize that I had done something I had never done and I had changed and grown a lot. It was not a failure but a victory. Like Billy in the film, I had hit a home run and didn't realize it. And I felt pride and satisfaction in that journey in my life . And this film made me see that. I've seen many films in my life but Moneyball is up there with the ones that had the most impact on me.

"It's not that hard. Tell em, Wash" *"It's incredibly hard!!"* 😂😂😂😂 Gets me every time.

"I hate loosing even more than I want to win." There is a whole psychology behind this idea. Some people hate loosing and other people love winning. It sounds ridiculous but they are very different things. The two personality types are historically better in different roles/professions. For example professional poker players who love winning more than they hate loosing tend to take too many chances and go bust. I found it really cool that they threw that into this movie.

How Philip Seymour Hoffman disappears into this character is a testament to how good of an actor he was.

Brad Pitt is one hell of an actor. He owned this role, his delivery of every line is perfection

"Check your reports or I'm gonna point at Pete." Great line. I'm an engineer, and this film appeals to me on so many levels. (I played almost a decade of baseball and spent years learning math.)

I love "smart" movies based around numbers like this. My favorite is The Big Short about the housing crisis of 2008. The cast is insane and it actually made me fascinated with mortgage bonds. Or if you want to stick with baseball, no one has reacted to Keanu Reeves in Hardball yet.

Fantastic video, Daniel & Samantha. _Moneyball_ is one of my favorite films for a couple of the reasons you caught. The Billy Beane story could take place in any industry resistant to change, but the more specific it is to baseball, the more relatable it ends up being. It's also a minor miracle this film got made: no special effects, no love interest, no triumphant ending. I don't even think Netflix would want it today.

Good lord, Aaron Sorkin could write a script based on insurance actuarial tables and it would be RIVETING. When you add a cast like this and performances like this you repeatedly get the most memorable and entertaining movies made in our lifetimes.

This is based on Michael Lewis’ book of the same name. It is considered not only one of the best books written about baseball. But one of the most insightful books on business ever written. It took awhile to figure out how to adapt it into a movie. But this movie does it brilliantly.

To your question: Major league baseball is the only major sport in North America without a hard salary cap to this day. And the player's union has been steadfast on that, MLB would basically have to implode in order to get around the player's union.

"I'm just saying, his girlfriend's a 6 at best!" - My favorite line of the film. Lol. 😅

What a great sports movie and a business movie too! And Pitt had his Robert Redford vibe going the whole movie

One of my favorites and I stumbled upon this gem while scrolling to find something to watch. I have watched it so many times and it's still holds up especially being a true story.

Not sure if you realized but this movie was written by Aaron Sorkin who is famous for writing films like A Few Good Men, The Social Network, Molly's Game and Steve Jobs, TV series like The West Wing, Sportsnight and The Newsroom and Theatre like the new adapted version of To Kill a Mockingbird on Broadway and in London. He was originally brought in by Spielberg to help do a re-write of Schindler's List. One of the great writers today.

The coach, Wash, is Ron Washington, who went on to manage the Texas Rangers to 2 World Series appearances (though they lost both). He won the world series in 2021 as the 3rd base coach for the Atlanta Braves.

I really love that they used This Will Destroy You's "The Mighty Rio Grande" in the trailers for this film. Can't remember if it was in the actual film but was glad to hear some post rock getting included. Edit: oh they did use it at the 6:00 min mark

The dialogue in this movie is so good, it really does feel like youre in the room participating in the conversation.

This really is a great movie, one of my favorites. What memory most attaches me is mentioned at the end. I was born and raised in rural centrat MA. For most of my life I had the fatalism typical of many long term Red Sox fans. I had long since moved away, but I happened to be in Worcester MA for a high school reunion when they finally made the run that ended the Curse of the Bambino.

The Hatteberg home run is on KZfaq and will give you the goosebumps, really exciting to get the A’s their 20th

Besides Rudy and Bull Durham, I’d recommend “Trouble With The Curve” with Clint Eastwood and Justin Timberlake about baseball scouting.

Big Blue Jays fan here. Some answers for your questions. -Yes, Hatteberg did have that particular home run to win the 20th game in a row. -There is no hard salary cap in MLB. Teams with a payroll higher than a set amount pay a luxury tax, which is divided between all the teams below the luxury tax line. -Analytics are taken very seriously now in both MLB and the other sport I watch (NHL). -Biy Beane is no longer the GM for the Athletics but is still involve in the organization. A difference from reality and the movie: Art Howe was actually fairly supportive of Billy’s approach. He knew damn well that it was Oakland’s only hope at the post season.

Best line in the movie? Peter Brand leaving Art Howe's office... "You want this door closed?" 🤣🤣🤣

Thank you for featuring this. It's my favorite movie ever made.

I love this movie. And it's the thing that sold me on Chris Pratt. Great reaction. It's time to do A League of Their Own, y'all.

Brilliant movie. The writing, directing and attention to detail is incredible. And every actor absolutely knocks it out of the park. Thanks for the reaction guys!

One of my favorite sports movies EVER!!! Mostly because of what happens after the movie ends. The Angels beat the Twins (the team that knocked out the A's) in the AL Championship, then they beat the San Francisco Giants to win the 2002 World Series! Obviously i'm a lifelong Angels fan! That being said....excellent performances by the entire cast!!!

I recommend this movie to anyone that'll listen to me, even put up with the obligatory "I'm not into sports". Neither am I. After my fifteenth or sixteenth watch I just lost track of how many times I've watched this gem. I't just one of those more than the sum of it's parts kind of thing. Thanks for a great watchalong!

I was at game number twenty. Still the loudest crowd reaction I have ever been apart of.

That scene where Billy Beane is talking to David Justice about his contract is one of the best scenes in the movie.

Not sure if mentioned... Pete as depicted in the movie was actually a combination of 2 guys in real life... I really love this film... in my Top 5 baseball films.

Wanted to mention the soundtrack, specifically the song "The Mighty Rio Grande" by This Will Destroy You. That song helped get me into post rock. It works perfectly in this movie, its very emotionally stirring.

This film always reminds me of when hospitals tried to switch to a 3-question algorithm (it was the nineties, so it was basically just a checklist) instead of the educated guess of doctors when it came to predicting which patients coming in with chest pains were in danger of a heart attack. The checklist was much more accurate - both in predicting which patients weren't actually having a heart attack and in assigning the ones with major complications to the correct medical unit - but the doctors balked at using it because they felt their instincts were better suited for the job, despite evidence to the contrary. People tend to value their instincts way too highly, even though it takes all sorts of irrelevant info (like prejudices etc.) into account which quite often skews their final opinion.

Glad you guys loved one of my absolute favourite films 😊

The guy Billie Bean (Brad Pitt) talks to at the beginning, the co-owner of the Athletics, is portrayed by Bobby Kotick, the real life CEO of Activision - Blizzard.

There is just so much subtlety in this film and it hits different everytime i watch it

Billy didn't want to move away from his daughter. That's the point of her singing at the end

Money will always be a major factor.. in the long run. It not only pays for the big stars but also a strong bench, strong bullpen, solid starting rotation, free agents..

Great movie maybe Brad’s best or favorite of mine, every role was cast perfectly, thanks Y’all

Glad you both liked the movie. True story. My friends and I are big A’s fans and remember that season well. When they filmed the movie at the Oakland Coliseum my friends and I got to be extras as part of the crowd in the stands. The call went out to A’s fans who wanted to be part of the movie and we showed up. We filmed for several days but all at night after 10pm. Sadly, today the A’s are still a small market team and the current ownership is seriously considering moving the A’s out of Oakland after several bad seasons and financial losses. They’ve been rumored to be seriously considering Las Vegas. I hope they stay and build a new stadium in a different location in Oakland but that’s not looking good.

clint eastwoods "Trouble with the Curve" is another great one in this same theme

The song, the girl sings at 9:18 is "The Show" by Lenka. Great song.

I love this movie! The one thing that never comes up in this movie, is that team had Chavez, Tejada, Kotch, Hudson, Zito, and Mulder. The team had three legit aces.

Gotta also do Bull Durham and Hoosiers. Also recommend The Natural. And the original The Longest Yard (with Burt Reynolds).

Dammit you two! Every time I’m about to go to bed, you drop a video🤬🤣🤣🤣🤣

When you seen this - see The Big Short, also with Brad Pitt - also about money...

This is such a brilliantly made film.

Loved the editor comments!! 😂 Always love your content, keep up the great work!

The song used in the film is a over The song is “The Show” by Australian singer Lenka

The craziest thing about this movie is that they didn’t have to dramatize any of it.

The major effect on baseball from this movie was that the proverbial cat was out of the bag. Virtually every World Series winner since that year has been based on the Billy Beane/Bill James model. Instantly, the Athletics were back in a disadvantaged position relative to the rest of Major League Baseball. The disparity in team payrolls generally correlates less with how wealthy the owner is than how much he’s willing to invest in the ball club. Naturally, this is a source of incredible frustration for fans of teams that run sub-par payrolls.

As my friends and I say whenever this movie comes up in conversation..."fuck, this movie SLAPS!!" So good, riveting, and well acted. Hell, this was the peak of my baseball watching days and I remember watching this play out...from Boston...and the anticipation we had about possibly landing Billy Beane was palpable in the city. Ultimately, he turned them down and they went with Theo Epstein, and ALSO hired Bill James (the guy they talk about who figured this out) as a consultant. Two years later, we had the biggest comeback in baseball history against the Yankees to make it to the World Series and won, finally breaking that drought or "curse" as everyone called it. Fun fact: Theo Epstein has basically punched his ticket to Cooperstown (the Baseball Hall of Fame for anyone who doesn't know, located in Cooperstown, NY) because not only was he the GM of the Red Sox who engineered a team that broke that curse, but he was also the GM of the Cubs when they broke their own, much LONGER curse/drought back in 2015 or 16. He may very well go down as the greatest GM in history for those moments...although he's also had some real stinkers for teams over the years.

I do often wonder if that old guy on the scouting team ever did find out who 'Fabio' was

It's probably one of the most inspiring films I've ever seen.

Can I just say how wholesome it is that I’ve never seen one of y’all’s videos without y’all holding hands

I was glad to see you guys watch this movie. I was working in baseball at the time that this happened, and those few years before and after changed the game significantly. Most teams have analytics departments now, and the advantage of the way the A's were evaluating has evaporated. Hatteberg was not a surprise to one group of people: fantasy baseball players. I had a friend that had Hatteberg on his team, and he was HUGE in the mid 90s in that regard. Teams that _don't_ spend on analytics lag behind and tend to make a lot more wrong moves for players. The Rockies are the prime example, spending their money in all the wrong places. Thanks for the great video!

As with all hollywood movies based on true events, there were certain embellishments that were exaggerated from real life, the biggest of which was probably Art the manager, in real life he is a perfectly lovely dude who by all accounts was a delight to work with, but the movie needed a villain so they made it him. As for the facts of the events though, those are all accurate. I'd highly encourage you to check out the clip on youtube of the real life Scott Hatteberg hitting the walk off homerun for the 20th win, the real thing is just as great as it is in the movie. Also Billy Beane is still with the Oakland A's today though he is now the executive VP and no longer the GM. He also OWNS a decent sized % of the A's so in the end he came out with waaaaaay more money by staying in Oakland than he would have ever gotten in Boston. Great reaction guys this was really enjoyable!

I always wanted to watch this but never got round to it but soon as I saw it on your schedule, I had to finally track it down and watch it before watching the reaction (hear that Hollywood, reaction channels promote your products and make you money). American Sports movie don't always translate well into money or views outside the US but this one did, I think it has actor pedigree and it can easily be understood even with little knowledge of baseball, it's a good movie. Another reason I wanted to see it is that Billy Beane became one of the owners of my local football team Barnsley FC, a few years ago, so that was a point of interest. I love the light trolling from your editor here too. ;)

I love this film. Travelled to Malaysia this week on a 13 hour flight and was delighted that this was available to watch, could easily have watched it a few times if my kids would have left me alone!

15:42 "Where're the Tigers?" poor Detroit ☹️

Jeremy Giambi, the player (not the actor) who was dancing in the locker room after losing a game, passed away last year. When I heard the news, this movie came to my mind. That was how I knew that such a person existed.

From the East Bay. Born in Walnut Creek grew up in Lafayette about 15 to 20 minutes from Oakland. My family and I are all big A's, Raiders, and Warriors fans. Actually, went to a couple of games that season when they won 20 in a row

Great pick, love your reaction. I always notice the difference in the club house/locker room mood as the film moves along.

ye'd enjoy 'the big short' too I reckon

Some great performances in this movie. This movie is Chris Pratt right between Parks and Rec and Guardians of the Galaxy. Before he was a leading-man action hero in GOTG and Jurassic World, and he portrays this vulnerable, nervous kind of guy so well. It's also great to see Jonah Hill in a non-comedic role. You can tell he's having a lot of fun with it.

I can reach with Daniel's story at the dentist. I was watching ''Master and Commander'' in the chair when the dentist returned to check on the freezing. ''Um, can you come back in about two hours?'' I asked and she was laughing a lot. I like the Moneyball film too but I think the Expos were using that strategy (value for money) first.

Great reactions to a true story. I was there. My best friend and I had a weekend and holiday season ticket package and we were there for most of the games in that winning streak.

Oh I love Moneyball! Very happy to see someone reacting to it!

Moneyball is based on a true story, and the streak and the walkoff homer happened. However, the A's had three All-Star level pitchers - Tim Hudson, Barry Zito, and Mark Mulder. That definitely helped. Also, Art Howe was much more on board than the movie showed. The film played it up for the drama. Always great reactions - keep it up!!

The Editor chipping in with "Field of Dreams" XD. Great job, Editor, on the whole video. Hope you get to talk to Daniel and Sam about how much of Moneyball is historically accurate.

This movie cuts very deeply for me as in late 1999 I joined a small startup out of college. They were trying to bridge sports and the internet. Through our CEO, Bill Rasmussen (founder of ESPN), we got hooked up withBill James' SABRmetrics. We saw the movement and were going to look at producing engines that used licensed historic stats, current stats, and build player/team evaluations. In addition we were working on engines for online fantasy sports, and real-time broadcasting tools to keep up with games (via tickers and play-by-play graphical overviews of baseball). We were even working with Sony Playstation and Sega Dreamcast to so a rent-by-mail concept. The company shifted all its resources into a concept of a trivia gameshow that put online fans against on-TV players. This got pitched to the current ESPN execs and it passed on. Which eventually lead to the companies demise in late 2000 due to having bet everything on that one deal. However it took utill 2011 and this movie, to explain to me how foundational a change that service could have been.

Some of the scouts in the meetings were character actors and some were baseball guys. Ken Medlock, who played the head scout Grady, was a long-time baseball player and coach and then shifted to acting. One of the other scouts in that meeting was Barry Moss. Barry played in the minor leagues for years and then got into coaching. He was once a manager for a minor league team, Salt Lake Trappers, owned in part by the Murray brothers - Bill and Brian-Doyle.

Great movie. It's only flaw it never mentioned once the main reason they won 103 games. The trio of starting pitcher's of Barry Zito, Mark Mulder, and Tim Hudson, won 57 games, threw 677 innings, and had a combined E.R.A. under 3.00. Zito went 23-5, with an E.R.A. of 2.75, and won the Cy Young - could've mentioned him at least once.

As you guys are quite familiar with the UK, you'll know we're football (soccer) mad over here. Red sox owner John W. Henry portrayed near the end of the movie, bought my football team Liverpool fc back in 2010 for £300m. It's been a slow and steady climb back to winning ways using an adaptation of the moneyball system. 14 cup finals, 8 trophies, runner-up 3 times in the league and 1 league championship in 13 years We're valued now at circa £3.7 billion.

I love this movie as a baseball fan. It helped me understand analytics in sports and why it should be embraced more. My favorite team, the Atlanta Braves, finally started embracing analytics a few years ago and now they're the best teams in baseball.

Nice reaction. I remember when I translated a part of the book with a group of passionate baseball lovers here in Italy. I translated the Bradford part where I learned Bradford used to pitch funny because his dad tough him that way after he had a stroke and couldn’t move his arm well anymore. Great book and film.

0:27 Million Dollar Baby (2004) almost!

When I saw this movie the first time I was going for my bachelor's degree in Economics. When I saw Pete's board I was like oh, he made a matrix! We do those in class!

In contrast to this movie, I also recommend, Trouble with the Curve, with Amy Adams and Clint Eastwood. It actually promotes the old scout way of doing things which is forget the numbers, go with your gut. I also like Draft Day with Kevin Costner. Another behind the sport scenes about the NFL draft.

I watched the shit out of this movie when it came out. But this movie REALLY shows the ins and outs of baseball, like what goes on when looking for your next player, or how a player doesn't pan out in baseball.

One of THE greatest sports movies of all time

The new idea guy name is Bill James who is currently still working for the Boston Red Sox, also he's a University of Kansas Grad! So Rock Chalk!

her: oh i got chills 😁 pitt: It's hard not to be romantic about baseball.

I'm a Twins fan, I have very fond memories of that As-Twins playoff series. I was also at the Twins-As game where the As were going for win #21 and they finally lost. It's not really shown in the movie, but the As had awesome starting pitching. Hudson, Zito and Mulder were probably in the top 2-3 rotations in baseball. The analytics vs old school portrayed here is very simplified, Billy Beane and the As definitely were pioneers, but their philosophy spread very quickly. As much as the old-school scout vs. spreadsheet/numbers guy stereotype portrayed, the reality is that all teams rely on scouts and advanced analytics. Analytics informs scouting, but it certainly doesn't replace it. The best teams are good at identifying and acquiring players that need further development. Nowadays, the basically all teams are using high-speed cameras to track the movement and spin rates of pitches and breaking down the biomechanics of players pitches and swing. It's very different from the spreadsheets vs. scouts, but it relies on both math whizzes and guys who have been watching baseball their whole lives. There is still a huge discrepancy in payrolls across the MLB, but outside of the top spending teams it's largely by choice. The Mets this year are spending $334 million on their payroll. The As are spending $56 million. The As will never spend like the Yankees, Dodgers or Mets, but they're payroll is mostly by choice, they're tanking this year and they're owner is widely regarded as cheap. There are structural disadvantages for small market teams, but the discrepancy is this significant because they are choosing not to spend. The median payroll is twice as much as the As are spending currently. The As get around $100 million (if not more) each year from TV deals and that's before anything else.

The montage of "The Streak" is one of the best montages in all of film.

There were some liberties taken with the story-telling (the turn-around in the A's season wasn't JUST from those moves and changes to the players mentioned/focused on in the film ... ALL the players in the line-up stepped up their game) ... and the manager on the field was NOT resistant to the GM's plan (that was completely played up for dramatic effect in the film) BUT ... this is a very cool story and well told. I've enjoyed watching & re-watching this quite a few times over the years. Y'all may also be interested in a Kevin Costner film called DRAFT DAY

If you want another film that has an insider's view of how sports management works, watch Draft Day with Kevin Costner. It's about the general manager of the Cleveland Browns dealing with the NFL draft.

You have witnesses one of the biggest us versus them argument in sports... the new math guys versus the old school romantics. This was genesis for advanced metrics, first in baseball, then to other sports.

Went from being my favourite sports movie to flat out being one of my favourite movies of all time on rewatch

Yes, the pay differential is massive. The Mets have 2 players that individually make more money than the entire Oakland A’s team payroll

The film fails to mention that a huge part of their sucess was dut to having 3 of the best starting pitchers in baseball and 2 players that hit over 30 home runs, all found the traditonal way thru scouting.

Billy Beane actually was part of two world series rosters, with the Twins in 1987 and the Oakland As in 1989, in both teams he was a defensive replacement, while having a miserable career at the bat, he was a complete superstar on defense, making highlight reel plays. The problem was that Beane just could not bat. Also the 2001 Twins had a roster nearly a lowly paid as the Oakland A's.

I was at a lot of those games. Opening day when Joe Satriani played the national anthem the PA system wasn’t working so we didn’t hear it unfortunately. My best friend who’s an A’s fan, (I’m a Giants fan) called me and told me to tune into the game for the record. I turned it on and they were up 11-0. I was rooting for them but laughing as they were blowing it. I still give props to them even though I’m not one of their fans. Just a baseball fan.

One of favorite sports movies. The acting from the main cast was great, the script was great and it really made a nice job of getting you interested and involved in the fortunes of the team.

I totally didn't recognize Chris Pratt at first playing 1st Baseman Scott Hatteberg.

This movie and Draft Day are probably two of the best sports business movies made.

8:50 "Yeah, how are you, Al...with my wife and daughter, sitting on my couch with your sandals, in this house that I'm still paying for?"