Sony Pictures/Twitter @HockeyStickMike
Sometimes a meme so unique and so pure that has caught a massive wave of popularity will come along to remind you — even if it’s for a brief, fleeting moment — how great the internet can be when it’s not busy being terrible. And this Moneyball and Lord of the Rings crossover meme is absolutely one of those.
During the early hours of December 26, a Twitter user shared a picture of Brad Pitt in the Moneyball poster and captioned it “Elrond putting together the Fellowship roster” in response to someone making a joke about Elrond using for “roster spots” on Hobbits.
Elrond, played by Hugo Weaving in Peter Jackson’s acclaimed trilogy of films, is the one who deems the group Gandalf, Legolas, Gimli), Aragorn, Boromir, Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin as the “fellowship of the ring” in the original 2001 film.
The comparison is that similar to Pitt’s Billy Beane in Moneyball, the real-life former general manager of the Oakland Athletics, Elrond put together a roster of people who, while largely overlooked and underrated by their opponents, all offered something unique in terms of their goal of building a winning roster.
At this time, just over 48 hours after the original tweet was posted, it’s racked up over 24 million views and thousands of hilarious replies on Twitter.
i'm not proud of the time i spent on this but i'm also not sorry for it https://t.co/aT62WZ5yG1 pic.twitter.com/SzaothlZNy
— Carter Rodriguez (@Carter_Shade) December 27, 2023
"Billy, we have Tom Bombadil practically signed already. He's got some years on him, sure, but he was never once tempted by the One Ring."
"If we give Tom Bombadil the ring, he'll just forget he has it. No, we take his 1 spot and bring in *sharpie noises* 4 halflings."
*groans* https://t.co/cCm4WVVRnn pic.twitter.com/adTCcKMfKY— Ben Crew (@BenjaminCrew1) December 27, 2023
“If we try to play like Mordor in here, we will lose to Mordor out there,” joked one Twitter user in a post that’s gotten over 15,000 likes.
“Elrond, this is Merry and Pippin, they’re hobbits. They are two of the most undervalued people in middle earth. These guys should cost a thousand silver pennies each. We can get them for a second breakfast,” joked another.
You can find all of the quote tweets of the post here. All three Lord of the Rings movies and the three The Hobbit prequels are currently streaming on MAX.