Sports analytics
Sports analytics are collections of relevant historical statistics that can provide a competitive advantage to a team or individual by helping to inform players, coaches and other staff and help facilitate decision-making both during and prior to sporting events. The term "sports analytics" was popularized in mainstream sports culture following the release of the 2011 film Moneyball. In this film, Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane relies heavily on the use of baseball analytics to build a competitive team on a minimal budget, building upon and extending the established practice of Sabermetrics.
There are two key aspects of sports analytics—on-field and off-field analytics. On-field analytics deals with improving the on-field performance of teams and players, including questions such as "which player on the Red Sox contributed most to the team's offense?" or "who is the best wing player in the NBA?", etc. Off-field analytics deals with the business side of sports. Off-field analytics focuses on helping a sport organization or body surface patterns and insights through data that would help increase ticket and merchandise sales, improve fan engagement, etc. Off-field analytics essentially uses data to help rights-holders make decisions that would lead to higher growth and increased profitability.
As technology has advanced over the last number of years, data collection has become more in-depth and can be conducted with relative ease. Advancements in data collection have allowed for sports analytics to grow as well, leading to the development of advanced statistics and machine learning, as well as sport specific technologies that allow for things like game simulations to be conducted by teams prior to play, improve fan acquisition and marketing strategies, and even understand the impact of sponsorship on each team as well as its fans.
Another significant impact sports analytics has had on professional sports is in relation to sports betting. In-depth sports analytics has taken sports gambling to new levels; whether it be fantasy sports leagues or nightly wagers, bettors now have more information at their disposal to help aid decision making than ever before. A number of companies and webpages have been developed to help provide fans with up-to-date information for their betting needs.
Sport-specific analytic tools and measurements
Major League Baseball (MLB)
Early history
Baseball was one of the first sports to embrace sports analytics with Earnshaw Cook publishing Percentage Baseball in 1964. This was the first publication citing sports analytics to garner national media attention. In 1981, Bill James helped bring SABR, one of the leading sports analytical organizations for baseball, into national prominence when Sports Illustrated featured James in the article He Does It By The Numbers by Daniel Okrent.In 1984, New York Mets manager Davey Johnson became the first known member of a known sports organization to advocate for the use of sports analytics. During his time with the Baltimore Orioles, Johnson had tried to convince the organization to use his FORTRAN baseball computer simulation to determine the team's optimal starting lineup. As manager of the Mets, Johnson tasked a team employee with writing a dBASE II application to run sophisticated statistical models in order to better understand the capabilities and tendencies of the team's opponents. By the close of the twentieth century, sports analytics had gained significant acceptance by the management of many Major League Baseball clubs, notably the Oakland A's, Boston Red Sox and Cleveland Indians.
At the same time, baseball fans and sports media had begun to adopt sports analytics as a way to understand and report the game. In 1996, Baseball Prospectus sought to build upon Bill James' work when it launched the Baseball Prospectus website in order to present sabermetric research and related findings as well as publish advanced metrics such as EqA, the Davenport Translations, and VORP. Baseball Prospectus has grown into a multi-channel sports media organization employing a team of statisticians and writers who publish New York Times Best Selling books and host weekly radio shows and podcasts.
Recent developments
The MLB has set the benchmark in sports analytics for a number of years, with some of the game's brightest minds having never set foot into the heat of a major or minor league baseball game. Theo Epstein of the Chicago Cubs is one of those minds who has never suited up in a professional baseball game; instead, Epstein relies on his Yale University education and the numbers behind the game to make many of his decisions. Epstein, known for his role in ending two of baseball's most famous streaks, is a member of a growing community in major league baseball who do not rely on years of major league playing experience. This community has been able to grow thanks to the in-depth collection of statistics that has existed in baseball for decades. With analytics being relatively common in MLB, there is a breadth of statistics that have become vital in the analysis of the game, which include:- Batting average is one of the most commonly discussed statistics in baseball. A player's batting average is determined by dividing the number of hits by the number of at bats for that player. This statistic shows a player's tendencies and which pitch usually strikes them out and can help them identify pitches they struggle with at the plate.
- On-base percentage is the percentage of times a player reaches base on either a hit, walk, or by being hit by a pitch. This is a significant offensive stat, as it looks beyond hits and, more importantly, illustrates how often a batter can avoid being put out at the plate. This is a more in-depth offensive statistic than batting average, as it takes into account walks and being hit by a pitch, both of which are indicators of how a player handles an at bat. Sabermetrics can help change a player's approach in order to raise their own base percentage, increasing productivity and, ultimately, their overall worth as a player.
- Slugging average is the calculation that determines the number of bases a player earns on hits. To determine this stat, the number of bases earned is divided by the number of at bats. This is a good measure for measuring a batter's power, as the higher their slugging average is, the more likely they are to hit for extra bases. For sluggers, analytics can help them improve decision-making at the plate. Now, hitters can study the tendencies of the pitchers they are going to face, thereby familiarizing themselves before they are up to bat.
- WHIP stands for Walks plus Hits allowed per Inning Pitched and tends to be viewed as a strong way to measure the success of a pitcher, as it illustrates how many baserunners the pitcher allows on both hits and walks. This is also a method for looking at a pitcher's efficiency. Now, pitchers can study the upcoming lineup they are going to face and focus on tendencies of the batter, such as where they stand on the plate, what pitches they tend to chase, and what part of the field they like to hit.
- Shifting is a defensive realignment from the standard positions to blanket one side of the field or another. The use shifts began as a result of hitters routinely getting base hits into certain gaps between fielders. With the use of analytics, managers and players can be aware of hitter tendencies and could implement a shift.
National Basketball Association (NBA)
Beyond professional basketball front offices, major sports media websites such as Basketball Reference are dedicated to the collection, synthesis, and dissemination of advanced metrics to pro and college basketball organizations, sports media members, and fans.
NCAA college basketball
, under coach Frank McGuire, was the first known basketball organization to utilize advanced possession metrics to gain a competitive advantage. Since then, sports analytics enthusiasts in basketball have created weighted statistics that measure each player and each team's on-court efficiency. Most basketball-specific advanced metrics feature a per-minute measurement to ensure that a player's incremental team contributions are measured irrespective of usage volume.National Football League (NFL)
In 2003, the sports analytics-focused website Football Outsiders pioneered football's first comprehensive advanced metric, DVOA, which compares a player's success on each play to the league average based on a number of variables including down, distance, location on field, current score gap, quarter, and strength of opponent. Football Outsiders' work has since been widely cited by analytical members the sports media establishment. A few years later, Pro Football Focus launched a comprehensive statistical database, which soon featured a sophisticated player grading system. Advanced Football Analytics has its EPA and WPA for NFL players.Grantland lead football writer Bill Barnwell created the first metrics focused on predicting the future performance of an individual player, the Speed Score, which he referenced in a piece written for Pro Football Prospectus. After analyzing data pertaining to running back success, Barnwell discovered that the most successful running backs at the NFL level were both fast and heavy, therefore, Speed Score weights 40-yard dash times by assigning a premium to bigger, often stronger, running backs.
One of the driving forces for the use of sports analytics in the NFL has been the growth of fantasy football. Fantasy sports writer C. D. Carter and peers at XN Sports, NumberFire, and the long-form fantasy football analysis site, Rotoviz.com, have established an informal subculture of fantasy football sports writers who refer to themselves as "degens". The degen movement is responsible for the creation of numerous American football efficiency metrics that better explain past football performances and attempt to predict future player production. Height-adjusted Speed Score, College Dominator Rating, Target Premium, Catch Radius, Net Expected Points, and Production Premium were recently created and disseminated by degen writers and mathematicians. Building on the work of these writers, sites such as distill a wide variety of established advanced metrics into a single player snapshot designed to be palatable to the casual sports fan.