Decisions

"I made one decision in my life based on money. And I swore I would never do it again." - Brad Pitt (as Billy Beane)

This month's baseball movie is Moneyball.  For me, Moneyball is not just a nice respite into the world of basball General Managers, trades and the ridiculous season the Athletics had in 2002, but helps me think through a couple of life issues.

First, life requires choices and when you make choices sometimes they work out great.  Sometimes not.  The question is do we bang our head against the wall hoping to change things or do we change.  Billy Beane had been a first round selection of the New York Mets, but finished is career only after six seasons with a .219 batting average.  He had the opportunity to go to Stanford University, but turned it down to play baseball.

As his career failed to progress he made the choice to move into scouting - a move that would ultimately help him into the GM's offices later.  This is important because like noted elsewhere in the movie - we all stop playing the game at some point.  We don't know when and many don't get to choose how.  Beane on the other chance made his own choice, changing paths as circumstances dictated.  By adapting to circumstance he overcame the situations that held him back.

The bigger thing I get from this movie though is money.  You do not have to make millions to be great or to do great things.  Making decisions based on money is just fool hardy and it is entirely possible to live on a reasonable budget and enjoy yourself.

I listen to sports radio all the time and a regular topic are the rookie dinners in the NFL where rookie players are expected to pick up the tab for older players so that they can eat steak and then take steak home to their dog.  This is moronic and sophomoric.  Why?

What this tells me is not that you are cool NFL Player, but that you are wasteful and not focused on the right things.  I like the idea of Beane turning down the Red Sox offer of millions of dollars in salary to stay in Oakland and demonstrate that some things are more important than money.  I like the idea that he showed decisions can be about more and they should be.