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 THE STAT 26Percentage of wireless customers who use their cell phones to take picturesMore Vitals
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APRIL 15, 2003
Soon, a PC May Be the Game's MVP [Page 2 of 2]
Technological analysis has crept into other sports, too. According to Joe Boyle, a product manager at Pinnacle, National Football League teams can use Pinnacle not only to pull up clips but also to plot which defensive combination yields the fewest first downs on short yardage inside their own 20. And they analyze the details of play progressions, formations, and even the body language of opponents to a much greater degree than ever before. Inexpensive systems can bring lesser versions of this capability down to high school and even youth-league coaches. For instance, Digital Scout in Columbus, Ohio, makes software for Palm handhelds that lets high school football, baseball, basketball, and soccer coaches watch a game video and use a graphical interface to code the results into a statistical package. They can later organize the statistics to better plan for upcoming games or track performance in ways heretofore only bigger colleges and pros could. "BEST SEASON EVER." This system isn't as sophisticated as the integrated digital video suites the pros use, but it saves an average coach six to seven hours per week that previously was spent breaking down videos with pen and paper into statistical categories. And at less than $1,000, it's cheap enough to have attracted 8,000 small college and high school customers so far. "I think the market is exploding," says Jim Emery, Digital Scout's chief operating officer and a former football coach and small-college player. "We have introduced several new sports, and they're all selling well. We had the best basketball season [for sales of his product] we've ever had last year." Bringing hard drives and rocket science to sports is already making a difference in who wins and loses. In the NBA, Bodaken says, the analysis goes much deeper into an opponent's game than ever before. "Now we're able to take away their first, second, and third favorite moves," he says. "That separates the good from the great in this league." MIGHTIER GMs. In baseball, player valuations are coming to depend even more on statistical findings. For example, older pitchers have had a much harder time signing contracts in 2003 than in the past, according to Wolverton. Some observers think that's a result of statistical evidence indicating that an average pitcher's effectiveness falls precipitously after age 30. That allows teams to look for statistical signs in nearly three dozen pitchers that their game is about to go south. "The upshot of what's going on is to concentrate unprecedented power in the office of the general manager," who's the main personnel decision-maker in baseball, says Michael Lewis, the author of the forthcoming book Moneyball, which offers a topical assessment of the sports' stats revolution. That's because general managers playing by the statistical book have less need for their managers' first-hand observations. In the same way, a general manager's acquisitions shape a team's strategy. "The manager is no longer a strategist," Lewis says. "What's left for him is a role as amateur psychologist." Of course, overreliance on stats and technology can induce introspective paralysis and, at times, stupid decisions. "If we find that we're minus-14 points on average in the fourth quarter against Sacramento [when the Lakers have] Kobe Bryant in the game, does that mean we take him out?" asks Los Angeles' Bodaken. "I don't think so." Lewis says in the top ranks of baseball, many old salts continue to chafe at the scientific study of their beloved game. But their objections may be futile. After all, the ultimate point of applying increasingly sophisticated technology to sports is to field a winning team for the least investment. And to achieve that, team owners will try just about any approach.
 By Alex Salkever, Technology editor for BusinessWeek Online Get BusinessWeek directly on your desktop with our RSS feeds.  Add BusinessWeek news to your Web site with our headline feed. Click to buy an e-print or reprint of a BusinessWeek or BusinessWeek Online story or video. To subscribe online to BusinessWeek magazine, please click here. Learn more, go to the BusinessWeekOnline home page  | | |
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