Sports Statistics

If you are an avid sportsfan like me, you watch alot of sports on television. And if you do, I am sure you have wondered at least once where all the sports commentators get their statistics.

We take them for granted, how they get magic figures out of nowhere. We hear lines such as "Shaq is 0 for 17 from the line", or "England have taken 7 shots on goal". Statistics help pad out commentators lines and fill up dead air. I should know. My barkada once had a mini basketball tournament, and we all took turns commentating our games. This was videotaped and when we watched the playback, we all realized how hard it is to think of different verbs to describe the same thing (the jumpshot, haha). No wonder famous commentators have trademark words (3-point kaboom!, anyone?).

I wonder how many people work behind the scenes to supply Bill Walton (NBA), John Madden (NFL), or Guy Mowbray (English Football, World Cup) all the statistics they say during a typical match. It must be a team of people taking down stats for the current game, as well as some boffin sitting behind a computer creating strange SQL statements, finding exceptions in the database of figures. And that database must be huge, for it seems that everything about the game seems to be recorded... attendance, weather, temperature, waterboys, etc.

Because of the overwhelming amount of figures, I have noticed some statistics which are quite irrelevant. Here are some of them:
- the history between two teams over a period of time. This only makes sense within one season or during a best-of series because the teams are relatively unchanged. There is no sense drawing up the history over the years because the players then aren't the same now, so there is no sense in comparing
- where one stat seems to determine whether a team wins or loses. For example, whenever Phoenix limits their opponent to x rebounds a game, they win. This statistic begs to be broken, simply so that I dont have to hear or read about it anymore.
- if A stat is x, then B stat is y. This happens most in baseball. For example, Pujols batting average is .500 with runners in scoring position. If I was a batter, I would damn try to hit the ball no matter who was on base or not. Why can't they just annouce his normal batting average?

In addition, there are also some statistics in which I have no idea how they are taken:
- percentage possession. How do they do this? Is there a person who watches the game and presses a button or flicks a switch whenever the ball is turned over? That must be the simplest job in the world!
- the display that shows where each shot was taken and whether it was made or missed. How in the world do they track all of Kobe's 100 shots around the court? Again, is there just one person for this that has a touch screen of a basketball court in front of him?
- type of shot taken, and details. In basketball, they sometimes show how many times a player has taken a jumpshot compared to how many times he took a lay-up/dunk. Or in football, how many times a player has used his left or right foot to kick (yes, no joke).

I think baseball is the sport with the most 'useless' stats. It kind of makes sense, since the game moves at such a snails pace sometimes... announcers really grasp at straws thinking of what to say. Like all data, statistics are relevant if you know how to analyze them. Otherwise, its garbage in, garbage out! I am not a manager nor a coach, so I would not know. I do know that alot of teams in various sports use alot more statistics than what we hear and see on television. But I am really not sure how alot of the statistics really make sense to the average (or even more than average) sportsfan.

In conclusion, I salute you, sports statisticians! You are the unseen heroes that make sportscasters good, and the ones who supply sports trivia worldwide!

Life is 100 percent Beautiful!