Sensory Technology and Next Gen Stats
With the help of Amazon Web Services, the NFL uses sensory technology to track the athletes’ and the football’s speed, acceleration and location during games.The use of this technology in the NFL has been renamed Next Gen Stats has become an extremely helpful way to collect and analyze data.
Using sensors located in players’ equipment, throughout the stadium and in the footballs, the NFL can track where they are on the field and how fast they are going. The NFL collects and analyzes this data to make better predictions about game performances and possible scenarios like how many QB sacks a player will get in a game.
How Does It Work?
Using Next Gen Stats, the NFL can collect data about player performance more easily. The chart shown to the left represents the performance of Tennessee quarterback Marcus Mariota throughout the 2017 regular season. Using sensors throughout the stadium and in player equipment, the NFL was able to see how well he performed when throwing to each of the separate sections on the field. The larger numbers represent his passer rating when targeting receivers in each section and the smaller numbers are what the league average rating is for throwing to the same area.
What’s the Point of This?
NFL teams use data like this to help them create game plans for opponents that they face. Daniel Mascaro, a fellow blogger from a communications class, stated that sports teams use data analytics more frequently to help them gain an advantage over their opponents. He said “Many progressive thinking individuals in sports have begun to analyze statistics into great detail, and are attempting to reshape their strategies for winning” (2019) In other words, sports teams have realized that numbers do not lie and that the analyzing the data of another team is the best way to game plan for them.
For example, NFL teams who played the Tennessee Titans would have used the data shown in the chart above to help them figure out the best way to shut him down. A team looking at this data would see that Marcus Mariota’s rating is above the leage average when he is throwing to the left and right side of the field behind the line of scrimmage, the left side of the field within 10 yards of the line of scrimmage, and the right side of the field between 10 and 20 yards away from the line of scrimmage. That team would know that those sections, colored green on the chart, would have to be heavily covered and that the red sections, where his rating is below the league average, could be left more exposed.
The sensory technology used by the NFL and Next Gen Stats has become a crucial tool for NFL teams when game planning for their opponents. As the technology improves, NFL teams will be able to collect more data on different aspects of player performances, making game planning a more complex task.
