The Failure of Rotisserie Baseball Logic

Andrew -

I recently completed reading two books that before I started reading either of them I had no idea how profoundly related they were. The first book was The Logic of Failure. It has been on my reading list for quite a while, recommended by Rob, a former colleague and now friend. The second book, Fantasyland (about Fantasy Baseball), I picked up on a whim at the recommendation of a friend (Michael) while riding home with him on the train. (You’re smart enough to already see the connection between these two books, aren’t you…)

The Logic of Failure is a clinical study into the psychology of why people make bad decisions that ultimately lead to catastrophic failures. The disaster at Chernobyl is one example that he uses in the book.

To study people’s decision making processes the author created a computer simulation game of two complex adaptive systems (a village in West Africa and a small town in Germany) and asked the study participants to try to improve the lives of the people in the simulation through decision making. More often than not, the simulation ended up with the people in worse shape than before the participants ‘started meddling’. Poor goal setting, focusing on incidentals, not addressing problems soon enough, lack of experience in the domain and cynicism are among the reasons for failure identified and discussed at length for the bad decisions people were making.

The Logic of Failure was a hard book for me to read for a couple of reasons, the first being that it is a very clinical study of why people were making bad decisions that ultimately lead to failure. But it was also difficult to read as I clearly saw several patterns in my own decision making processes that have not served me well.

Well, after beating myself over my poor decisions making skills I decided that I wanted to pick up something to read that would be just for fun - try to lighten my mood a little. I needed something to read that was not work related, not a self-improvement book, not technical - just something for pure entertainment. Well, I hit the jackpot with Fantasyland.

Fantasyland is the story of a sportswriter’s first attempt at playing Rotisserie Baseball during the 2004 Baseball season. Sam Wallace from the Wall Street Journal joined Tout Wars, the premier Rotisserie Baseball league, for his inaugural season of Fantasy Baseball. With his in depth knowledge of baseball, ready access to players and coaches for their insights (using his press pass to get into each team’s club house) and two full time advisors he put on his personal payroll (and an occasional consult from an Astrologer) he was convinced that he could outdo the others in the league. It’s compelling reading as he takes you through the months of his decision making process in preparation for selecting his team during draft day and then toiling over managing the team through trades during the season. (And, it is a very funny book. My favorite line from the book is how he described feeling after being taken advantage of by a seasoned Tout Wars competitor in a lopsided trade: “He worked me over like a drunken chiropractor.”)

Well, with me associating The Logic of Failure with Fantasyland in this blog posting you probably have already concluded that Sam Wallace didn’t do well in his first season in Rotisserie Baseball and you would be correct: eighth place out of 12 teams. The same patterns in decision making documented in The Logic of Failure that led to failure were being made by Sam Wallace in Fantasyland. But the real brilliance of Fantasyland is the epilogue, on the last page and last paragraph of the book:

"Sam Wallace returned to Tout Wars in 2005 to draft a second incarnation of the Streetwalkers Baseball Club. With only two nights to spare on the evaluation of American League ballplayers, he arrived at the draft in New Your fully expecting to be thumped like a traffic cone. Six months later, he won..."

Andrew - once you get some experience in a domain, whether it be Baseball or Project Management, don't over-analyze the problems within the domain. Apply the sound fundamentals that you have learned and trust them work for you. Always be passionate about your domain and never become cynical over the effects of your decisions. Love what you do and success will follow.