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The Value of Individual Sports Metrics

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We hear it from athletes all the time, ”there’s always room for improvement.”  So, what is the value of individual sports metrics?  Simple.  They tell you where that room for improvement is.

Baseball

He’ll never be Mike Trout, but Justin Turner of the Los Angeles Dodgers quietly had a break out year after overhauling his swing.  No one had ever heard of Jose Bautista until he turned thirty and suddenly figured things out. Now thousands of fans call him Joey Bats and wear T-shirts featuring his famous bat flip. Amateurs may not have hitting coaches to help them break out like those two, but numbers have the potential to help baseball players more than any other sport. With a batter’s swing, the numbers don’t just show his or her physical deficiencies, they show mechanically deficiencies too.

METRICS TO ANALYZE:

  • Swing Speed
  • Time to Contact
  • Swing Direction
  • Power
  • Efficiency

Basketball

You know what makes a pro basketball player special?  Everything. They are amongst the most physically gifted athletes in the world.  But what separates the best of the best is work ethic and consistency.  No one has spent more time in the gym than Kobe.  Steph Curry makes draining threes look easy, but it isn’t.  He works at it.  If athletes want to beat opponents to a rebound and gets shots off over defenders, they better be able to jump higher and faster.  The best way to get there is to start recording in-game numbers and tracking progress.

METRICS TO ANALYZE:

  • Jump Acceleration
  • Rotation
  • Vertical Height
  • Hang Time

General Athleticism

Sports like football rely a lot on technique. DB’s need to leverage their hips and push off with the correct foot, offensive tackles need proper footwork and so on. Technique can take athletes a long way, but general athletes often have to improvise and for that they need elite athleticism.  For athletes to improve every element of their game, they need to take training to the next level.  They need to record and improve upon the game play factors that will help pad their game stats.

METRICS TO ANALYZE:

  • Sprint Acceleration
  • Rotation
  • Vertical Height
  • Hang Time

Golf

Golf has such an obvious need for analytical data. There are so many variables and elements to the game that all depend on swing mechanics and consistency.  We can harp on keeping our elbows in and our head down, but without data, it’s hard to tell where the problems in a swing really lie.  For golf, we want to divide the data into full swing and putting.

FULL SWING METRICS TO ANALYZE:

  • Backswing Time
  • Downswing Time
  • Total Swing Time
  • Swing Tempo
  • Swing Speed
  • Power Index
  • Efficiency Index
  • Velocity Direction
  • Energy Transfer

PUTTING METRICS TO ANALYZE:

  • Backstroke Time
  • Forward Stroke Time
  • Total Stroke Time
  • Tempo
  • Loft
  • Lie
  • Back Stroke Rotation
  • Forward Stroke Rotation
  • Rotation Change

runner-know-your-metrics

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STUDY: The World’s Top 20 Most Socially Engaged Skate Channels on YouTube

Top 20 Most Engaged Skateboarding ChannelsToday active Americans research nearly every major purchase and life decision. We are constantly connected, socially savvy, outfitted with mobile and wearable devices, social networks, and easy access to online communities with outspoken peers.

According to an exclusive Blast Motion survey – 73% chat about favorite sports on social media, and 60% share photos/videos/stats about their personal performance. Although these statistics are high, authentic social engagement is still lacking among many specific sports and lifestyle brands — effectively sidelining them from the conversations within their own communities.

Fortunately, when looking at the social skateboarding community, we discovered an outstanding group of athletes, vloggers, shredders, coaches, media outlets and brands who have mastered the art & science of creating authentic content, using social media to build genuine and lasting connections with the people who share their passion… and sense of humor!

At Blast Motion we are dedicated to redefining the digital experience with wearable motion capture technologies. By shining the spotlight on these highly engaged skate channels and unveiling their secret sauce, we are aiming to open the floodgates for sports and lifestyle brands to discover innovative ways to join the conversation — authentically and on the community’s own terms.

Here’s just a few tips from a group of skateboard vloggers with a collective 1.2 million subscriber base:

  • Steven Fernandez: Don’t post the same thing as everyone else and post everyday.
  • Josh Katz: You’re going to make it further if you’re doing it out of a genuine passion for skateboarding and not just to get lots of followers.
  • Andrew Schrock: Odds are you’re not in Street League or the X Games. If you’re not doing the biggest, best skateboarding, then you need to do something to stand out and make people remember who you are…And have fun! People want to see that you actually love what you’re doing. Smile once in awhile or do something goofy.

About

The study was commissioned by Blast Motion and conducted by digital marketing and sports influence marketplace Raynforest, Inc. Engagement ranking is based on the actions such as average daily views as a percentage of total subscribers recorded on November 14, 2014. Reach is a ranking of the total views per video, as reported by vidstatsx.com