Bills Analytics Department?

[ghz in pittsburgh]

http://www.buffalobills.com/news/article-2/Bills-launch-analytics-department-with-hire-of-Lyons/3bf96f90-a18a-4845-aaae-2d20cc83d72b

So it is spreaded to all 3 areas of football, business, and marketing strategy.

Let's see what they come up with how much Byrd is worth.

[Night Train]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

It's like company time tracking... Justify every toilet flush.


I understand the so-called premise of the exercise but it screams 2 things.

1. Budget at the ground floor, with the primary profit figure of the business being protected.
2. Always having to justify your job, regardless of performance. The human element is removed.

I've been through this a couple times. I can tell you morale is always short term and turnover is blind.

[DraftBoy]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

It's like company time tracking... Justify every toilet flush.


I understand the so-called premise of the exercise but it screams 2 things.

1. Budget at the ground floor, with the primary profit figure of the business being protected.
2. Always having to justify your job, regardless of performance. The human element is removed.

I've been through this a couple times. I can tell you morale is always short term and turnover is blind.

Analytics are often an expensive endeavor to undertake, especially year round. Not sure if the first point makes sense short term. If in the end the department allows to find bargain FA's who can produce as a lesser cost is that really a bad thing?

[Pinkerton Security]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

Analytics are often an expensive endeavor to undertake, especially year round. Not sure if the first point makes sense short term. If in the end the department allows to find bargain FA's who can produce as a lesser cost is that really a bad thing?

yeah, I would hate it as far as a business process goes but in the NFL, you ALWAYS have to justify your job. If you're not producing, you're going to get cut/traded/etc, so I agree, it should allow us to ensure everyone is playing up to their contract when compared to other available options.

[Historian]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

DOUG: "Russ, Do we sign Byrd?"

RUSS: "Rock...Paper...Scissors..."

[DynaPaul]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

I got the feeling from reading the release that this is biased more towards the business end than it is towards player performance and compensation. They're going to be looking at shaving off certain things, like the length of a hot dog for example, to save cash and increase profitability while searching for statistical trends. That's not exactly what I had in mind when they said they were forming an analytics department.

[DraftBoy]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

yeah, I would hate it as far as a business process goes but in the NFL, you ALWAYS have to justify your job. If you're not producing, you're going to get cut/traded/etc, so I agree, it should allow us to ensure everyone is playing up to their contract when compared to other available options.

That's how my job runs (not on analytics but on production) and I love it!

[IlluminatusUIUC]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

Hopefully the analytics department warns them not to point inside the opponents 40 and other wise moves.

[Victor7]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

Wonder if this means even more cheapness when it comes to players. Hope not.

[BuffaloRedleg]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

Hopefully they don't think this will be able to be of great use evaluating players. It is almost impossible to isolate player performance in football making player analytics neat but not nearly as useful as in baseball.

They are pretty useful in making gameday decisions, so we'll see.

[WagonCircler]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

...and he just happens to be from Rochester, where Brandon went to college.

I'm sure there's no one better qualified in the entire world than one of Russ Brandon's cronies.

[Typ0]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

I have worked with analytics for years. It's a big scary word but quite simple really. It means we are going to keep track of our decision making process and outcomes in a quantifiable way. We then are going to use that information about the past to leverage against our decisions in the future. If you don't do this all the knowledge in an organization exists and is influenced by the brains in the organization. Well brains can only process so much, they are prone to influence and they need good information to form sound decisions.

If you are trying to compete with organizations that are using analytics and you aren't they have a competitive advantage. They are inherently getting more bang for the bucks they spend because they are building this knowledge base.

[Typ0]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

Hopefully they don't think this will be able to be of great use evaluating players. It is almost impossible to isolate player performance in football making player analytics neat but not nearly as useful as in baseball.

They are pretty useful in making gameday decisions, so we'll see.

The thing is you don't look for a be all that ends all model when doing analysis. The reality is if a business you are competing with in the marketplace can get a 1% increase in performance they build momentum that chips away at your market share. The same could be said about player evaluation. If the PATS are 1% better because they are using analytics that minute percentage keeps them on top. If we want to overtake them we need to employ analytics and do it better than them or we are going no where. I don't get the bashing of analytics...it's an attempt to win any way you look at it.

[BuffaloRedleg]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

The thing is you don't look for a be all that ends all model when doing analysis. The reality is if a business you are competing with in the marketplace can get a 1% increase in performance they build momentum that chips away at your market share. The same could be said about player evaluation. If the PATS are 1% better because they are using analytics that minute percentage keeps them on top. If we want to overtake them we need to employ analytics and do it better than them or we are going no where. I don't get the bashing of analytics...it's an attempt to win any way you look at it.

I agree to an extent. It is extremely difficult to assess whether or not that 1% increase is due to something that has nothing to do with your analysis.

How would you know whether you are better because you are doing better at analytics or if it was just because EJ got better?

It's just too difficult in football with the sample size being so small and the difficulty of isolating things to establish causal relationships.

Like I said though, it is important for when deciding to go for it on 4th and 1 on the opponents 40 yard line or other sorts of gametime decisions.

In general I've grown away from model analysis in many aspects of life (especially the market). Nassim Taleb made sure of that.

[coastal]

Re: Bills Analytics Department?

I hate Russ Brandon.