Analytics and Football. Convince me please

[RiverDog]

Analytics is the use of data (and computers) to make decisions, usually with large amounts of data.

That is a broad topic. You cannot just say it works or does not work.

It depends on the data you use, how you choose to interpret it, the models you build.

Just as important is the realization that what you do not know is often more important than what you do.

What people often do is identify the data they have, cobble together models based on them, and then try to draw conclusions from that. It can work but it isn't going to be consistently effective.

The best approach is to figure out the factors that are important, the data you have on those factors, and then the data you are missing. You can then figure out the gaps.

AI is great for noticing things, or finding patterns in the data. So it can recognize patterns in the data, and even identify salient factors you might have missed.

But both AI and ML have 3 massive issues:

- it overly weights past vs present or future
- it does not deal well with change (especially sea change)
- It cannot evaluate data in context

So you are still reliant on human expertise to make interpretations based on the resources/tools available.

The other thing to be aware is that making decisions based on analytics changes the very success rates the analytics shows you would have. (For same reason that chasing KPIs can distort the expected result hitting KPIs normally provides)

There is no analytics works or does not work. It depends on how you apply them. But AI/ML and even computer vision are going to be huge tools to help teams build competitive advantages so you probably should expect to see them.

Excellent post, and I agree completely.

At this stage, they haven't been able to accurately quantify enough of the sport to make analytics a dependable method of decision making for most situations in football, at least when you contrast the NFL with MLB. But like you, I do think that day is coming and that we're going to hear more about it.

Analytics is nothing new, it's just that we've given it a different name. For decades, they've been doing a form of analytics in their scouting and drafting, everything from the combine to the Wonderlic or some other type of psychological or intelligence testing. Tex Schram can be credited with the computerization of scouting back in the 60's. It's the same principle: Based on thousands of samples, they build a model of what the characteristics of their "perfect" left tackle or "perfect" wide receiver looks like then measure a potential draft choice according to those standards. They measure the width of their hands, the length of their arms, etc.

 

[hawkfan68]

Too much number crunching ruins the sport for me. But it's what attracts the folks to the sport nowadays. Monkey see Monkey do world. Once moneyball worked for baseball, other sports started to incorporate it. Now that's all what is focused on these days.