 |
| An example of the information the camera can provide for the spectator |
Sources:
1. Youtube.com - "How technology is changing baseball"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tctsHXxLCM
Thursday, January 19, 2017
Entry 1 - The National Pastime Reinvented by Technology
As the sport of baseball steams ahead toward the third decade the 21st century, numerous technological advances have changed the way teams (and fans of those teams) view players and their respective talent level. Baseball has always been defined by statistics, but recent advances in computing allow for much more in-depth statistics that really paint a solid picture of what a player brings to a team. New technologically advanced cameras installed in ballparks can analyze much more concretely the value a player brings defensively. For example, on a simple fly ball to the outfield, the cameras can determine, in mere milliseconds, the outfielder's max running speed achieved and distance covered, hang time and launch angle of the baseball, and even the acceleration rate and first step time performed by the defender. The implementation of these cameras has been made possible by the latest achievements in Computer Science.
An organization called MLB Advanced Media devotes all of it's time and resources to these technologies, providing more information for teams and fans. General managers and assistants can crunch those numbers to determine which players are the most valuable to have on the field, revolutionizing the way teams are assembled. These statistics can be combined to create new stats, like UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating) to measure a defender's defensive ability, or WAR (Wins Above Replacement), which compiles the number of total team wins a player is worth over a "replacement level" player. As technology continues to advance, increasingly more accurate determinations of a individual player's talent level will be realized, ensuring that nobody is overlooked based on a scout's simple "eye test" on a player's skill.
Sources:
1. Youtube.com - "How technology is changing baseball"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tctsHXxLCM
Sources:
1. Youtube.com - "How technology is changing baseball"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tctsHXxLCM
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Hi, Palmer! This is a really cool development in the statistics that drive baseball. I think other sports like soccer and football are also beginning to use similar technologies (among other factors like injuries, leadership abilities, and scandals) to help decide which players to retain and recruit. Very informative post!
ReplyDelete-Emily
I think the area of instantaneous statistics in sports is just beginning to take flight, and there is massive room for improvement. When golf is televised, similar technology is used for tracking balls that are hit so they are more easily seen. These advances in tracking objects are quite beneficial to the viewer experience.
ReplyDeletePalmer, awesome post, I remember watching ball games this past season and hearing the announcers comment on outfielders max speed and path to the ball and always wondered how they did that. Do you think there is a limit to this technology? The post Billie Bean era is full of metrics and statistics, especially on the offensive side of the game. But how will the mixture of all these new measures affect scouts decision?
ReplyDeleteI think that the technology I outlined above will continue to produce new ways to evaluate player talent, but there will always be a place for a human scout's analysis of a player's skill and/or how beneficial they will be to a team. A computer can tell you everything you want to know about a player's skill, but it can't tell you (for now at least) how a player influences team morale/chemistry, whether or not they are a good teammate, and other intangibles. Player analysis, I believe, will continue to evolve to become a balance of what a computer can see (i.e. sabermetrics), and what a human can see.
Delete