Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16 • Hacker News Board

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#31

Post by Malarkey73 » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 9:50 AM UTC

rfergie wrote: post #28

laxatives wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a good concept, but like all games, it just succumbs to exploiting imbalances. In Football Manager, its just finding all the Uber Wunderkids who can easily be bought for less than the lowest rated players in their prime. Then you just invest all of your money in coaching/facilities who can also be bought for significantly cheaper than adult players and in a few years, once the players hit like 18-19,…

If a real football team did this I think it would work. Why don't they? Which step is the unrealistic one in the game?

Having an objective measure of each players skills and their potential.

FIFA EA - Dribbling Ability: 23 (subjective)

Moneyball - On Base Percentage 23% (objective)

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#32

Post by dagw » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 9:57 AM UTC

luckroy wrote: post #23

ssharp wrote: post #16

Does anyone have a recommendation on an online course or tutorial that walks you through doing this type of applied analysis in R? I prefer learning using actual problems, where the complexity of analysis increases gradually.

The Analytics Edge[1] on edX might be what you're looking for. In one of the lessons, they do some rudimentary recreations of the analysis described in Moneyball. [1]: https://courses.edx.org/courses/course-v1:MITx+15.071x_2a+2T...

Another course is Sabermetrics 101 https://courses.edx.org/courses/course-v1%3ABUx%2BSABR101x%2.... It's obviously focused on baseball and you have to understand baseball to get much out of it, but many of the lessons on how to map performance statistics to actual game results can probably be applied, at least conceptually, to other sports.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#33

Post by trdrake » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 10:19 AM UTC

Eremotherium wrote: post #7

You're using math. That's cheating!

Also: ask Liverpool how well "Moneyball" works out in real life. (hint: not so much)

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#34

Post by koyote » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 10:24 AM UTC

rfergie wrote: post #28

laxatives wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a good concept, but like all games, it just succumbs to exploiting imbalances. In Football Manager, its just finding all the Uber Wunderkids who can easily be bought for less than the lowest rated players in their prime. Then you just invest all of your money in coaching/facilities who can also be bought for significantly cheaper than adult players and in a few years, once the players hit like 18-19,…

If a real football team did this I think it would work. Why don't they? Which step is the unrealistic one in the game?

Some of them sort of do or are trying to do this already.

Arsenal actually bought StatDNA, a football data analytics company, a couple of years ago. So time will tell how they will use this to their advantage.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#35

Post by thirdsun » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 10:43 AM UTC

sinatra wrote: post #4

Consider doing this "Moneyball" experiment using Football Manager [1] games. Those games are made for soccer/football management simulation. And your "Moneyball" kind of playthrough is called LLM (Lower League Management) in the FM community. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football_Manager

Came here to check if someone mentioned Football Manager already.

FIFA is basically child's play compared to depth of Football Manager where your transfers actually mean something and are in fact hard to pull off - even if you have the budget, often there's no way of attracting recognizable names or any talent at all without a certain level of reputation. I'd consider it a true challenge.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#36

Post by jumirugu1 » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 11:01 AM UTC

It's less bored playing carrer mode as Player.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#37

Post by cadab » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 11:24 AM UTC

sinatra wrote: post #4

Consider doing this "Moneyball" experiment using Football Manager [1] games. Those games are made for soccer/football management simulation. And your "Moneyball" kind of playthrough is called LLM (Lower League Management) in the FM community. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football_Manager

Theres a whole series from The Set Pieces[1] where they play FM as Bristol City using the Moneyball playthrough.

[1]http://thesetpieces.com/features/football-manager-meets-mone...

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#38

Post by filipeferreira » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 11:40 AM UTC

laxatives wrote: post #21

There's a bunch of interesting tactics I've heard of people employing in the FIFA economy, including cornering certain low value cards as well as "investing" in players like Eric Dier who are likely to be upgraded in the next update so that they can sell an overrated silver who is now only attainable as a midlevel gold.

Yes that's true, although what you're talking about is the Ultimate Team mode. There's none of that in career mode.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#39

Post by mkohlmyr » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 11:50 AM UTC

rfergie wrote: post #28

laxatives wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a good concept, but like all games, it just succumbs to exploiting imbalances. In Football Manager, its just finding all the Uber Wunderkids who can easily be bought for less than the lowest rated players in their prime. Then you just invest all of your money in coaching/facilities who can also be bought for significantly cheaper than adult players and in a few years, once the players hit like 18-19,…

If a real football team did this I think it would work. Why don't they? Which step is the unrealistic one in the game?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Masia#Alumni https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_F%C3%A1brica#Notable_Alumni https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajax_Youth_Academy#Notable_for...

Presumably the unrealistic part is the how well it is possible to predict who will excel to a world class level.

You take base athleticism and technical ability and you can clearly produce national league quality players very predictably and consistently. One would assume it is more difficult to judge future world-class potential and even more so the likelihood that potential will be lived up to.

Re: Playing “Moneyball” on EA FIFA 16

#40

Post by filipeferreira » Fri, Mar 11, 2016, 11:53 AM UTC

trdrake wrote: post #33

Eremotherium wrote: post #7

You're using math. That's cheating!

Also: ask Liverpool how well "Moneyball" works out in real life. (hint: not so much)

Their scouts aren't that great and their approach wasn't the best either. Trying to replace a player like Luis Suarez, that single-handedly carried the team, with a player like Daniel Sturridge, doesn't really work unfortunately.