Is Liverpool Playing Moneyball?

Billy Beane made "Moneyball" and sabermetrics household names in baseball by using tangible statistics to evaluate talent. The Boston Red Sox and Beane-disciple Theo Epstein were able to translate these theories into World Championships.

Whether John W. Henry and New England Sports Ventures - owners of the Boston Red Sox - have been able to apply those same principles as the new owners of the Liverpool Football Club remains to be seen. Jason Davis of US Soccer Players analyses whether Henry and Co. are on the same track with Liverpool.

It wasn’t crazy to think that John W. Henry and New England Sports Ventures were just what Liverpool Football Club needed when the group, also owners of the Boston Red Sox, took over the club back in October. Henry and his partners had a track record of success, custodianship of an American sports franchise with obvious parallels to Liverpool FC foremost on their resume. Saying all the right things, Henry and NESV swooped in to give the club’s desperate faithful new hope.

It also wasn’t crazy to think that Henry and company would deploy the same tools in the soccer world that helped them turn the Red Sox into a multiple World Series winner after an 86-year title drought. A statistical approach to player evaluation, sometimes called Moneyball, sometimes called sabermetrics, but always a bit confusing to the layman, gave the Red Sox the reputation of savvy collectors of talent.

The baseball operation is hardly run on a shoestring budget, and the spending isn’t particularly frugal, but the prevailing wisdom is that the Red Sox turned a new number-crunching approach into a superior level of bang-for-their-buck. Without the resources to compete with the rival Yankees on a dollar-for-dollar basis, ownership installed a system designed to make up for the shortfall.

Monday’s transfer madness in England shows that if NESV is using the same approach with their soccer property, it isn’t precluding them from spending in large amounts when they deem it necessary. At about the same time the Reds were offloading star striker Fernando Torres to Chelsea for £50 million, they were making a splash by bringing in Luis Suarez from Ajax and Andy Carroll from Newcastle.

Despite not spending much more on two new strikers than they earned through the sale of one, it was the purchase of Carroll that had observers buzzing. At £35 million, Carroll’s price was 38 percent higher than that of Suarez’s, came out to be slightly more than what Barcelona paid to obtain Spanish all-world striker David Villa from Valencia, set a new British record, and ranked as the eighth highest transfer fee of all time - all for a player with only 19 Premier League games to his name.

The 22-year old Carroll shows promise, as his 11 goals in those 19 Premier League games for Newcastle prove, but the price Liverpool ponied up to get him was shocking. So shocking, in fact, that it seems directly contrary to Moneyball ethos NESV supposedly employs.

Perhaps Henry and NESV panicked. The dying hours of the transfer window does funny things to smart men, leading to rash decisions and exorbitant fees for players hardly worth the money. Though Liverpool have pushed their way up to seventh after a dismal start to the season, Henry and his group didn’t buy the club, a perennial Champions League contender prior to last season, to wallow mid-table.

With fans demanding better, and club legend Kenny Dalglish now manager, the pressure is on NESV to push Liverpool back up to their “rightful” place in English soccer. Torres’s exit multiplied the pressure to make moves that would prove to Liverpool fans that the new ownership is committed to that quick turnaround. Henry himself probably didn’t decide to go after Carroll, but as the face of the ownership group he is ultimately answerable for the choice to do so and the price that was paid.

Depending on how you look at it, the purchase of Carroll could be proof that the Moneyball approach isn’t (yet?) in place at Liverpool, that NESV couldn’t afford to wait for the concept to pay dividends, or that the group did what all clubs with the means do when they have a need: buy, at whatever price the market dictates.

In the reality of the moment, Liverpool was just another rich club overpaying for a domestic player, not the trailblazers of a groundbreaking way to go about tackling the transfer market. It’s very possible that Liverpool will always be the former, has no designs on becoming the latter, and won’t be an English soccer version of NESV’s Red Sox.

Although, to be fair to Henry and NESV, the Moneyball mythology well outweighs its actual role in the Red Sox's success. The team has a method, and they apply it to determining the value of certain players. But it’s not a magic bullet, and very often the Red Sox are forced to augment their roster with big money talent in order to become real contenders.

No great player is so undervalued that only a statistical analysis will undercover them. The Red Sox are able to “win with Moneyball” because they have the funds necessary to sign the type of player that can to make up for the system’s shortfalls.

If the same approach is taken by NESV at Liverpool, expensive signings will remain part of the way the club does business even while they twist the sabermetic-inspired player evaluation process to the game of soccer. Spending on top talent and using statistical analysis in an effort to build a championship caliber team are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Especially when a club, like Liverpool or the Red Sox, has the luxury of doing both.

For Henry and his partners, the beauty of the implication that there’s a Moneyball approach now in place at Liverpool lies in the fans believing that the system gives the club an advantage when it comes to identifying potential signings. Even the eighth largest transfer fee in history could conceivably be explained as the result of a process that identified Andy Carroll as a uniquely valuable talent.

Only time will tell if he was worth the fee, or if Liverpool massively overpaid as so many believe. For the time being, it’s enough that NESV is flexing financial muscle, giving Liverpool fans reason to believe there’s hope for a return to the top of European soccer in the not-too-distant future.

If Liverpool does return to their old winning ways, at least a few people will credit Moneyball as a contributing factor. No one will be entirely sure if it deserves that recognition. We might have Andy Carroll to thank for that.

Osorio named manager of Honduras

Former Major League Soccer coach Juan Carlos Osorio, who turned down an offer from Chivas USA so he could guide Colombian champ Once Caldas in Copa Libertadores, on Wednesday was appointed head coach of Honduras' national team.

Mexican coach Juan de Dios Castillo resigned a little more than a week after leading the Hondurans to the Copa Centroamericana title and an expected berth in the June 5-25 CONCACAF Gold Cup.

Osorio, who formerly was coach of the Chicago Fire and New York Red Bulls and was pursued by Chivas after guiding Once Caldas to Colombia's Clausura title in December, said earlier this week that he had an agreement to take charge of the Catrachos when de Dios Castillo left the post, but such a move wasn't expected until after the Gold Cup at the earliest.

“We decided the right person to lead the national team process, which we hope concludes in Brazil [at the World Cup finals] in 2014, is professor Juan Carlos Osorio,” said Fenafuth official Rafael Ferrari told the Honduran media.

Osorio, who attended college and began his coaching career in the U.S., will debut Feb. 9 in La Ceiba, Honduras, against Ecuador, which is led by Colombian coach Reinaldo Rueda, who was in charge of Honduras at last year's World Cup in South Africa.

Porter preaches success on the field & in the classroom

Caleb Porter and Akron University have proven to be a success on the field and in the classroom. Jeremiah Oshan examines the culture that Porter has created at Akron.

In the last three years alone, Akron has supplied 11 players to MLS, more than any other school. Eight of those players were picked within the first 10 picks of the draft and five of them were picked among the first four.

While the easy conclusion might lead you to believe that Akron is little more than a pro-soccer player factory, the reality seems to be far more nuanced. Akron head coach Caleb Porter is undoubtedly creating professional athletes, but he's doing it in a way that belies the conventional image of what that means.

His teams are regularly among the nation's academic leaders. In 2009-10 they posted a team GPA of 3.33, eighth best in the country, and the semester the Zips won the 2010 College Cup they posted a 3.51 team GPA. In Porter's five years at Akron, seven Zips have been named Academic All-America and 16 have been named Academic All-Conference.

"Every preseason began with him saying, 'You’re a student first and an athlete second,' " Zakuani said. "I really remember those preseason meetings. I’ll never forget that. If you fell behind on your studies and your grades dropped, you wouldn’t train. He took school seriously. He was talking to our teachers all the time. I used to hate it, but I appreciate it now."

Like many of his Akron teammates, Zakuani left school early. After leading the nation with 20 goals during his sophomore year, Zakuani signed a Generation Adidas contract and was made the top pick in the 2009 MLS SuperDraft. After winning the Hermann Trophy - given to college soccer's best player - Bunbury left early as well and was the No. 4 overall SuperDraft pick. All five of the Akron players taken in the first round of this year's draft also left early, with No. 3 overall pick Perry Kitchen leaving after his freshman year.

For some, this is further proof of the "factory" label. How serious can students be if they're not even sticking around long enough to get their diplomas?

Of course that ignores a primary role of college: Preparing students for their careers. While many college coaches seem to fall into one of two categories - either they emphasize school and all but force players to stick around for four years or they openly recruit aspiring pros and let them slack on school - Porter seems to have succeeded in finding a middle ground.

"When I got to Akron, there were a lot of local players, a lot of guys whose dream was playing in college," Zakuani said. "He started bringing in guys who wanted to play beyond college. I remember meeting Kofi Sarkodie, this guy was a pro from Day 1. He was acting like a pro, training like a pro, behaving like a pro. The same for Teal Bunbury. We would be in the dorms saying, Oh, we are going to play in this league or that league and play against each other.

"That came from him. Our training sessions were just like that. They were competitive, they were fun. It was a bunch of guys who really believed they could play pro and they made it so. It’s important to play at the next level and he’d say he’d never stand in our way if we wanted to leave early. I think that says something about him that he could have held them back. I could have stayed for my senior year and we would have all been playing together (this year), but it comes from him."

The poster child for this kind of student/athlete duality has to be Sarkodie, the ESPN Academic All-American of the Year who posted a 3.96 before being picked No. 7 overall in the SuperDraft midway through his junior year. Despite being one of the highest rated soccer players in the country throughout his youth, he earned straight A's and enrolled at Akron as biology major with the intention of eventually attending medical school. Only a B+ in ecology and an A- in physics robbed him of a 4.0, and he now says that he intends to finish his degree and maybe even fulfill his dream of becoming a doctor after his playing career is over.

"The way that Caleb runs the program, it’s been awesome," Sarkodie said. "The standard from Day 1 when I got there was perform on the field, but right away get to class and make sure you’re doing your work off the field.

"You’re going to need something to fall back on. Soccer is a short career. Maybe you can play until your mid-30s, but you still have a lot of life left. Coach Porter really emphasized that. Let’s put 100 percent into playing, but also put your all into school. It’s emphasized all year around. It’s the culture that we have at Akron: to be equally in tune to the classroom and the soccer pitch."

Making it easier for a player like Sarkodie to succeed in the classroom and on the field is an environment that celebrates that kind of achievement. Zemanski, for instance, earned a degree in mechanical engineering. All seven players who were drafted this year had GPA's over 3.0, led by Kitchen's 3.945. Joining Sarkodie on this year's Academic All-America team were Anthony Ampaipitakwong, Chad Barson and David Meves.

To be sure, there's a fine line that Porter is walking. On one hand, he's recruiting players who know college is a stepping stone to the pros, but he's also bringing in players that are going to class and keeping up their grades.

"We pick a certain profile," Porter said. "Our niche has been to get soccer junkies who are also good students. If they wanted to party, they wouldn't come to Akron. They are here to focus on soccer and focus on a certain culture. Those are the kids we attract and the kids we go after.

"We don’t get the kids that want to be at the biggest name, in the best conference. I don’t claim to have the best campus. There are better schools out there. But I don’t think there’s a soccer environment that’s better than ours. Most of our kids are honors students. They're getting a great academic experience. The balance of the two, I don’t think there’s a better situation."

Vidic has emerged as the ultimate leader

Wayne Rooney scored two goals and assisted on the other to pace Manchester United to a 3-1 victory over Aston Villa last night, but as Greg Stobart of Goal.com reports, United captain Nemanja Vidic continues to play at his best when his team needs him most.

The real hero at Old Trafford on Tuesday night was the man who has not once let his standards drop this season, the man who has emerged as a true leader and an inspiration to his team-mates.

Nemanja Vidic is, on current form, the best central defender in the world, a colossus at the heart of the United defence, a born winner who can be relied upon when his side need him the most.

Last month, he produced the best defensive performance of the season at Tottenham to earn Sir Alex Ferguson's side a goalless draw despite being down to 10 men following Rafael Da Silva's dismissal for two yellow cards. Vidic responded to the call, made sure his team-mate's error was not punished to maximum effect and that United still kept a clean sheet.

Rock at the back | Vidic among world's best defenders

Here, moments after Aston Villa had dragged themselves back into the game through Darren Bent's strike, Vidic curled home a beauty that Red Devils strikers Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov – over £50 million worth of striking talent – would have been proud of. With four league goals so far this season, Vidic's return at the top end of the pitch has matched that of Rooney, his £250,000-a-week colleague.

As United stretched their unbeaten run to a club record 29 league games, the Serbian defender was the driving force, the talismanic captain, Old Trafford's answer to John Terry but even more exceptional at his day job.

"Vidic is, on current form, the best central defender in the world, a colossus at the heart of the United defence, a born winner who can be relied upon when his side need him"

Vidic, 29, was appointed as team captain by Ferguson at the start of the season ahead of club captain Gary Neville and England skipper Rio Ferdinand, who had been wearing the armband before injury troubles last term convinced Ferguson to change his mind.

Ryan Giggs, Edwin van der Sar and Patrice Evra have all also captained United but – in this team full of leaders – Vidic is the one who looks and acts like the most natural captain.

His character and performance levels this season have been so impressive that United supporters can be forgiven for forgetting that he was unsettled in the summer, that he dislikes the weather in the north-west and has considered a move abroad on more than one occasion.

But he signed a new four-year deal last August – and you have to wonder whether he was promised the captaincy to stay at the club. He now conducts himself like the archetypal leader of a top English football team – but with the ability to match the hyperbole that surrounds such a status at a big club.

Vidic and Ferdinand are perfectly suited to each other, a wonderful partnership that has been almost indomitable at Old Trafford this season, where United have conceded just eight times in 12 home games.

The Red Devils are five points clear at the top of the Premier League and their performance against Aston Villa suggested they are ready to really hit their straps and stride away from their challengers in the coming weeks.

But they wouldn't be where they are if it wasn't for Vidic. All the talk will be about whether they can now go on a run of form – but the most important player for United remains Vidic. Their captain, their leader and a man who you feel could stay at the club for many, many years to come.

Rio: "Sir Alex Ferguson's drive can help us match Treble winners"

Rio Ferdinand claims Sir Alex Ferguson’s will to win has put Manchester United on the brink of emulating the club’s famous Treble winners.

“It comes from the manager because the manager has got that desire and will to win. He has been here for almost 25 years and if he’s still got it, then why haven’t players that have only been here for a year, two years, 10 years, whatever?

“It comes from him and filters down through the club and that’s always the way it has been. That’s why you see so often that we can come back from adverse situations and create results like we did against Blackpool."

An Inside View of the Portland Timbers preseason training

Kip Kesgard reported on the Portland Timbers preseason training.

I had heard Coach John Spencer runs a rather animated training camp, and I would say even that description didn’t describe the atmosphere of training. Coach Spencer was planning on using the first week of camp to focus entirely on fitness and stamina, and his first exercise was to break the field players into two groups for shuttle runs around cones placed on the pitch. While one set of players went indoors to stretch, do yoga and complete other calisthenics, the other collective formed two lines behind the cones and ran tandem patterns around the stations. The drill not only demonstrated quickness, but communication between players, as two players ran paths mirroring each other, so there were bottle neck points that required one player to let the other know where he was. Spencer was providing vocal encouragement to most players, but occasionally yelled feedback for players to improve their speed or focus when needed.

The field players then finally went over to complete some short passing and shooting drills while goalkeepers Troy Perkins and Adin Brown worked on their own separate drills. While it was my first chance to see Perkins, I was struck by Brown’s athleticism for a larger man. He remarked after the drills that his weight was slightly down from last season, but it’s impressive to see someone that big move so quickly when needed. At about 45 minutes into training, the field players switched off, and the second group came out to complete the same running drill.

What amazed me most about this display was the emphasis on fitness, something that Spencer echoed in some of his remarks to the team. “What we do now helps us later in the season, and it’s important to take everything seriously regardless of what it is,” said Spencer, and it reiterated a point he has been stressing in camp. You can’t build upon game strategy, starting rotation or opponent scouting without completing the basics, and it’s important to treat those fundamentals importantly. He also mentioned how especially pleased he was with everyone’s attitude as they all took this time seriously, trying to earn attention in the coach’s eyes. To a man, it seemed that they have bought into the seriousness of the early season conditioning.

That theme echoed in his post game comments when one of the reporters asked if the training session was more important for an expansion team versus an established club, and Spencer used the time to share his philosophy on where the Timbers are. “I don’t want to make a big deal about this, and it may come back to haunt me, but for me, good players can play anywhere. I think we’ve got good players here whether they’re coming together for the first time. We just need to concentrate more, we need to work hard, we need to nurse these guys together on the field, off the field, and everybody needs to work hard all the time.” He continued, regarding the term expansion, “I don’t use the term. Anyone else can use it, but for me, we’re a new team. We’re not a new club that is building a new stadium and get the front office organized. This club has been here before. All we’ve done in my mind has been promoted, like from the Championship to the Premier League. We’ve been promoted from Division 2 soccer to MLS, that’s all.”

I talked with defender Steve Purdy, a defender from the USL Timbers that was signed to the MLS team, and he was ecstatic to be making the jump with the club. “I’m really excited to continue my career here in Portland, because I’ve begun to think of Portland as my home. It’s going to be really exciting to represent the city and the fans in MLS, and I can’t wait to get out there to celebrate this new chapter for the Timbers.” When I asked him about what position he might play, he said, “I’ll mostly focus upon right back like I did last year, but I’m just excited to play wherever this team needs me.”

My next conversation was with trialist and former USL Timbers midfielder Tony McManus. McManus was a key cog in the Timbers attack for 2010 with his fiery approach on the pitch, but in 2011, he’s another player just trying to secure a spot for 2011. “I’m happy to be here and get the chance to represent Portland moving up to MLS. The fans keep pushing me to do my best, and everything willing, I’m going to be there when the season starts, but at the same time, I’m having fun and couldn’t think of a better team to be a part of than the Timbers.”

Later on, I finally met one of the newest Timbers, goalkeeper Troy Perkins. It’s been a whirlwind since he got here after the trade with D.C. United, but he’s focused on his newest team much like he approaches his goalkeeping. “I spent about a week looking at homes, and I think I’ve seen just about every part of Portland there is to see. For about four of the six days I’ve spent about 16 hours a day on the street looking at houses looking at different areas. I feel like I’ve already lived here for a year and a half.”

Regarding his time with D.C. before coming to the Rose City, Perkins put the best spin on things: “The way I look at it is that you have to go through something bad to get to the good. It’s something I had to endure and be put through in order to really appreciate a club like this and to be in a place like this. It’s almost like a tax you have to pay in order to enjoy the rewards.” While the trade shocked him at first, he’s looking forward to making his name here in Portland and play in front of passionate fans. “It’s a privilege as it’s something that I think every club and every player wants that experience to see a wall of supporters behind you while intimidating our opponents.”

Finally, I spoke with Ryan Pore, the leading scorer from the 2010 USL Timbers, and he’s excited about the challenges that MLS brings to Portland. “I know the talent level here has been upgraded, and it’s up to all of us to push ourselves to represent the Timbers. I had a great 2010 campaign, but it’s a new era for the Timbers and we all need to step our games up. I’m trying to help some of our newer guys get acclimated to Portland, and let them know what to expect when the season starts, but right now, I’m just excited to be representing the Timbers as we move to MLS.”

The theme with each player I spoke to was the same as what Spencer echoed earlier in the day. While MLS might label this club as expansion, the players and coaches view this as a new chapter in the legacy of the Timbers, and they are taking nothing for granted as they move to the highest level of soccer in America. If the team is able to keep up this intensity and passion that they showed during their session on Friday, I’m confident this group is going to surprise more than a few established teams.

Torres deal highlights record spending in transfer window

Paul Kennedy of Soccer America recaps the January transfer window, which was highlighted by significant action and movement yesterday.

So much for English club owners becoming parsimonious. On the final day of the January transfer window, Chelsea spent $120 million to acquire Spaniard Fernando Torres and Brazilian defender David Luiz. In the first transfer since Boston Red Sox owners took control of Liverpool, the Reds shelled out all the money they got for Torres and then some to sign Andy Carroll from Newcastle and Luis Suarez from Ajax.

Torres wanted out at Anfield and finally got his wish when Chelsea agreed to buy him for an English record $80 million.

“It’s my dream to win the Champions League and I’m sure I can, playing for Chelsea,” he said. “I think all my teammates share that dream with me. This is the target for every footballer -- to try to play for one of the top clubs in the world and I can do it now. It has been two, three, four very, very hard days for me but I can now say that I am a Chelsea player.”

David Luiz's on-again, off-again transfer featured three trips to the Lisbon airport. A move from Benfica to Chelsea was called off for the first two, but papers were signed shortly before Monday night's deadline allowing to join the Blues.

The four deals were among six involving EPL clubs to top $25 million in January.

Bosnian Edin Dzeko went from Wolfsburg Manchester City for $46 million, while Aston Villa paid a club record $29 million for English striker Darren Bent.