Ethan Godfrey

Professor Samborowski
Sport Practicum
December 16th, 2015
Sports Stats and Analytics
Information is a source of learning. But unless it is organized, processed, and available
to the right people in a format for decision-making, it is a burden, not a benefit.
-William Pollard (MeetingResult)

This past semester, I have had the opportunity to take the first ever sports
practicum that consisted of stats and analytics. Coming into this class, I honestly had no
idea what I was getting myself into. Knowing some people that have taken their
practicum, theyve always talked about how they worked with Nichols sports teams and
what they did and what not. I was nervous walking into the first class because I had not a
single clue what I wanted to do. I wasnt sure that this was a class or it was just a
practicum. I didnt know if I had to clock in to record my hours or if I had to wash the
football teams jock strings. When I tell you I had no idea, I seriously and honestly had no
idea.

Stats and analytics are used in every single sport. From baseball and football to
water polo and croquet. Anything that has number is considered along the lines of stats
and analytics. Personally, Im a baseball stat geek. Believe it or not, when I was in high
school, I used to watch every single Red Sox game and keep a book. I used to find out

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what the team batting average was for that game and what each pitchers strikeout to walk
ratio was. I found a quote from Ford C. Frick, which basically sums up baseball.
"Baseball is probably the world's best documented sport. And thats 100% right. My
father and I were always into stuff like that. For football I was always interested in
looking back at old stats and seeing how many rushing yards a running back would have
or what Joe Montanas QBR was. Stats were and will always be interesting to me.

Here at Nichols College, sport management students are required to take a sport
practicum and ever since I heard about it my freshman year, I have been so nervous.
From hearing what all the other students were doing for their practicum and how some of
them hated it. But receiving an email from Professor Samborowski, inviting me to join
his sports stats and analytics practicum, was the greatest thing ever. As Ive mentioned
about 10 times so far, I love stats. So for a stat geek to be in a sports stat class, made me
extremely excited. The first day of class, Professor suggested I work with the Nichols
College football team and I had no problem with it. I have a background in football since
Ive played for 3 years.

I was a tad bit nervous when the time came for me to speak with the football
coach, Dale Olmsted. I didnt know what to expect. I felt a little more comfortable
knowing I was also doing this practicum with another student good friend of mine,
Anthony Rodi. We both walked into his office and we asked him what he wanted from us
and we were willing to do whatever he wanted for us to do. Immediately his eyes lit up
and he wanted me to keep track of 3rd down conversions, success in the red zone, and

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field goal and extra point percentage. I would attend some home games and take stats
during the game and/or go to the postgame stats and go to the play by play and take down
every stat.

Id have to say the most challenging part about this practicum was definitely
writing down all the stats. Nichols College provides live and post game stats that I was
able to look back on. Coach Olmsted told me 3rd down is the most crucial play of the
game. So, I would look at the play by plays and see how many time theyve made it to 3rd
down, what play they did (pass or rush), who did what on 3rd down, and if that play on 3rd
down was successful converted to a 1st down or 4th down. I noticed on the website they
would record all the stats at the end, so I was able to see what the overall 3rd down
conversion rate was. I thought to myself, This is too easy! So I went back into each
quarter of every game and came up with a percentage for each quarter and decided I was
going to compare each game with each quarter. Teams get fewer opportunities on third
down, so third-down performance is more volatile -- but it's also is a bigger part of a
team's overall performance than first or second down, because the result is usually either
very good (four more downs) or very bad (losing the ball to the other team with a punt),
says Aaron Schatz.

Coach Olmsted loved when I showed him the breakdown 3rd down percentage of
each position. This gave him the opportunity to see who his weak spots were and who he
could trust to convert the 3rd down. I also broke it down by if the conversion was
successful or unsuccessful from passing or rushing. This also gave coach the opportunity

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to see what play he should do on 3rd and short and 3rd and long and who he could use in
order to convert that 3rd down. Each week I would either email or meet with him and
show him the graphs of each week and compare that week with the last one to show him
where we have improved and where we still need improvements.
Working with Coach Olmsted was great. Whenever Anthony and I stepped into
his office, he always had the biggest smile on his face. Coaches love seeing new things,
especially stats pertaining to their team. He loved our work so much that he asked us if
we could continue working with him as recruiters and he handed us his log in information
for FrontRush, a recruiting website. Coach threw down a list of 50-60 recruits on the first
day and showed us how to put these recruits into the system. I enjoyed doing it and I still
do. On the first night, I completed 68 recruits. I sent coach an email and told him I had
completed that and he was amazed. So what does he do? Hands me another stack and
tells me to keep going.

One of the greatest changes in the sports world in the past 20 years has been the
use of mathematical methods to analyze performances, recognize trends and patterns, and
predict results, says author of the book, Analytic Methods in Sports: Using Mathematics
and Statistics to Understand Data from Baseball, Football, Basketball, and Other Sports,
Thomas Severini. (CRCPress) Taking the classes Tuesday and Friday 8 am-9:15 am
every week really helped me with my understanding of stats and analytics and I used
what I learned in class to create my weekly presentations and graphs for Coach Olmsted
and my Friday discussions with my class. What I really enjoyed about the class is that
there are so many ways to present numbers. There are so many different kinds of

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graphing methods out there. People hate a presentation when numbers are just ranted off
to them without any visual aid. With graphs, this gives the audience a way to really see
the comparison between that certain topics. The goal is to turn data into information,
and information into insight, says Carly Fiorina. (Blog.FusionCharts)
Taking this class really helped me learn more about the stats and analytics of
sports. From histograms and Z score to calculating slugging percentage to QBR. The
class exercises werent those exercises that you dread doing. I actually enjoyed doing
them. Ive always wanted to know how to calculate slugging percentage and I now know
how to calculate everyones slugging percentage in the MLB. I had an in the news where
I broke down all the possible National League candidates for MVP. I broke them all
down by batting average, slugging percentage, and on base percentage. I wouldnt have
been able to do this presentation if it werent for learning this material in class.
This past fall, I had the opportunity to take part in the Regional Sport
Management Case Study Competition for the 2nd year in a row. I was very iffy about this
year until the case study came out and it had to deal with sports statistics. All of the class
exercises, working with my coach, and outside knowledge made me light up. I went to
my teammates, Anthony Rodi, Justin Doyle, and Austin Weber, and told them that we had
to do this case study. They are all stat geeks as well so they were all in. The case study
topic was to compare two teams or players from pre-ESPN and post-ESPN. We decided
to use the 1971-1975 Oakland Athletics and the 1996-2000 New York Yankees. These
two teams were very similar and we found that out by comparing all the different stats
there are in the world of baseball. To compare offensive stats we used batting average,
home runs and OPS. For pitching stats we used ERA, WHIP, and winning percentage.

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Some of these stats were fairly new to us so we had to do some research to see what each
of these stat categories meant to us. During our presentation, we knew that some of the
judges werent going to know what some of these stats mean, so we tied the definition in
with our presentation to help them understand. For some reason, they still didnt
understand the stats even though we explained it thoroughly, but stuff happens. I really
did enjoy doing the case study this year because we all loved numbers and comparing
teams.
When I say I enjoyed this class, I really do mean it. Stats have always been a part
of my life. Stats are the only way you can win an argument and I have all the stats to
back them up. I have already told underclassmen to take this course because its
something I think every sport management student would enjoy.

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Reference Page
"Is Your Organization Leveraging One of Its Most Important Assets?" MeetingResult. 3
July 2015. Web. 15 Dec. 2015.
Fiorina, Carly. "10 Quotes on Data Visualization - FusionBrew - The FusionCharts Blog."
FusionBrew. 16 May 2014. Web. 15 Dec. 2015.
Schatz, Aaron. "Football Outsiders." Football Outsiders Everything. Web. 15 Dec. 2015.
Severini, Thomas. "Analytic Methods in Sports: Using Mathematics and Statistics to
Understand Data from Baseball, Football, Basketball, and Other Sports." CRC Press.
Web. 15 Dec. 2015.
Weider, Robert. "Baseball Stats Quotes." Baseball Stats Quotes. Web. 15 Dec. 2015.

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