Bills analytics department fired/restructured

[ricojes]

http://buffalonews.com/2018/01/24/bills-subtract-analytics-staff/

 

What's the opposite of robust?

A long-running joke about the Buffalo Bills has been about their much-heralded "robust football analytics operation," a phrase used by Russ Brandon in 2013 to indicate grand plans to bring a progressive and aggressive approach to football.

Five years later, the Bills have blown it up.

[YoloinOhio]

Sounds Iike an overdue move. Hopefully they actually bring one in for football purposes now instead of ticket sales analysis

Edited January 24, 2018 by YoloinOhio

[eball]

Jesus Christ, just hire me.  I'll be glad to tell them when to challenge a call, when to go for it on 4th down, when to call time out, and when to break their tendencies.

[co_springs_billsfan]

Ralph is so cheap!

[Steptide]

32 minutes ago, eball said:

Jesus Christ, just hire me.  I'll be glad to tell them when to challenge a call, when to go for it on 4th down, when to call time out, and when to break their tendencies.

It is incredible how much nfl teams overthink certain things. I think analytics has a benefit though 

[row_33]

14 minutes ago, Steptide said:

It is incredible how much nfl teams overthink certain things. I think analytics has a benefit though 

 

do these gormless nerds actually go up to a defensive lineman and start quoting stats to the thousandth decimal point to try to teach them something about how to play the game?

 

 

or approach Mike Trout to advise him how to make better contact based on a stat?

 

[yungmack]

There is a lot of overthinking in football these days. Here is a legend out of the past, Big Daddy Lipscomb, with his "analytics" on defense: "You just keep picking up guys and throwing them away until you find the guy with the ball. Him you keep."

[baskingridgebillsfan]

for some reason nobody analyzed that  the qb can't play  

[ColoradoBills]

3 hours ago, ricojes said:

http://buffalonews.com/2018/01/24/bills-subtract-analytics-staff/

 

What's the opposite of robust?

A long-running joke about the Buffalo Bills has been about their much-heralded "robust football analytics operation," a phrase used by Russ Brandon in 2013 to indicate grand plans to bring a progressive and aggressive approach to football.

Five years later, the Bills have blown it up.

 

Could you paste the article?  I would like to read it.

[Fadingpain]

2 hours ago, row_33 said:

 

do these gormless nerds actually go up to a defensive lineman and start quoting stats to the thousandth decimal point to try to teach them something about how to play the game?

 

 

or approach Mike Trout to advise him how to make better contact based on a stat?

 

No.  Your understanding of analytics, how it works, and its benefit to a football team is rather poor.

 

Analytics does things like show you, with statistical analysis, that you have a much better chance of winning a game with 2 minutes left if you go for it on 4th and 1 from your opponent's 47 yard line, as opposed to punting and trying to get the ball back again.

 

It's mostly based on analysis of countless football games and scenarios over a large period of time and studying what works and what doesn't work based on probability.

You then go with the highest possible probability of success.

 

Most NFL teams are still clueless about this stuff, including the Bills.  McDummy showed us all that multiple times this year.

 

This is because most NFL coaches are glorified gym teachers and would never be confused for brain surgeons, hedge fund managers, or physics professors. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[3rdand12]

5 minutes ago, Fadingpain said:

No.  Your understanding of analytics, how it works, and its benefit to a football team is rather poor.

 

Analytics does things like show you, with statistical analysis, that you have a much better chance of winning a game with 2 minutes left if you go for it on 4th and 1 from your opponent's 47 yard line, as opposed to punting and trying to get the ball back again.

 

It's mostly based on analysis of countless football games and scenarios over a large period of time and studying what works and what doesn't work based on probability.

You then go with the highest possible probability of success.

 

Most NFL teams are still clueless about this stuff, including the Bills.  McDummy showed us all that multiple times this year.

 

This is because most NFL coaches are glorified gym teachers and would never be confused for brain surgeons, hedge fund managers, or physics professors. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

you are speaking to the jacksonville game?

 or speaking of Jacksonville vs the Patsies

[fansince88]

3 hours ago, eball said:

Jesus Christ, just hire me.  I'll be glad to tell them when to challenge a call, when to go for it on 4th down, when to call time out, and when to break their tendencies.

Jesus Christ is in charge of the hiring process?

 

[Kwai San]

4 hours ago, eball said:

Jesus Christ, just hire me.  I'll be glad to tell them when to challenge a call, when to go for it on 4th down, when to call time out, and when to break their tendencies.

 

A whole damn lotta people standing in line for the job E-Ball!!  They seriously need help in those areas at times......hoping another year of McDermott and full year of Bean and the new OC will fix some of those issues.....

 

 

Gormless nerds......beautiful!

 

GO BILLS!!

1 hour ago, ColoradoBills said:

 

Could you paste the article?  I would like to read it.

 

 

Yeah me too......yeah I am cheep.

Edited January 25, 2018 by Kwai San

[Lurker]

I'm sure Rex was only interested in foot size analytics, so 'robust' was always going to be a misnomer....

[sven233]

4 hours ago, eball said:

Jesus Christ, just hire me.  I'll be glad to tell them when to challenge a call, when to go for it on 4th down, when to call time out, and when to break their tendencies.

Yup.....there are a ton of us "casual fans" that know more about clock management, game situations, etc. than these coaches in the NFL.  It is really shocking just how bad these "smart football people" are at the basics.

 

Could I sit down and design an entire offense from scratch?  Maybe over time, but it would be difficult for sure.  Knowing whether or not to call a timeout, punt, or go for it in certain situations is not.  These coaches make it a lot more difficult than it needs to be.

Edited January 25, 2018 by sven233

[ColoradoBills]

8 minutes ago, sven233 said:

Yup.....there are a ton of us "casual fans" that know more about clock management, game situations, etc. that these coaches in the NFL.  It is really shocking just how bad these "smart football people" are at the basics.

 

Could I sit down and design an entire offense from scratch?  Maybe over time, but it would be difficult for sure.  Knowing whether or not to call a timeout, punt, or go for it in certain situations is not.  These coaches make it a lot more difficult than it needs to be.

 

BB's teams seem pretty good at it.  I'm hoping Daboll can help with that, at least on the offensive side of the ball.

[ndirish1978]

There is zero point in posting an article that is located behind a paywall and then briefly alluding to what the article is about. I'll get a subscription to that newspaper when they get rid of 2/3 of their writers, so that's not happening anytime soon. Might as well retitle this thread "here's my take on a story a large portion of you won't ever read."

[Lurker]

11 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

There is zero point in posting an article that is located behind a paywall and then briefly alluding to what the article is about. 

[ricojes]

Key Notes...

 

***General Manager Brandon Beane will hire replacements, although the next department's structure isn't clear.

***Buffalo's first attempt to establish its department will be viewed as a failure.

***As expected, the Bills never would divulge how Lyons or Linton (the 2 people in the analytics department) crunched the numbers.

But Russ Brandon gave a glimpse into their approach for a June 2016 story in The Buffalo News. Brandon conceded it's fair to say Lyons' work pertained more to the Bills' ticket pricing than with X's and O's.

"We look at it from a holistic perspective," Brandon said. "We hired Michael to oversee all of our business analytics as well. He is a crucial part of the mix between marketing and content and the decisions we make in all platforms of our business.

"Most people assume the analytics person is driving data and running it down the hall to the GM. But it's a lot bigger than that."

In a quote from Brandon's interview that didn't make it into the story, he noted Lyons' role in generating football data was predicated on the direction given.

"With Jim Monos and the player personnel department and with Rex and his coordinators and [contract negotiator] Jim Overdorf and his department," Brandon said, "Michael is able to provide information that is almost custom to what they may or may not be looking for."

[YoloinOhio]

10 hours ago, ndirish1978 said:

There is zero point in posting an article that is located behind a paywall and then briefly alluding to what the article is about. I'll get a subscription to that newspaper when they get rid of 2/3 of their writers, so that's not happening anytime soon. Might as well retitle this thread "here's my take on a story a large portion of you won't ever read."

I assume a lot of people do subscribe, though. So why not discuss the article? 

[BillnutinHouston]

13 minutes ago, ricojes said:

 

"We look at it from a holistic perspective," Brandon said. "We hired Michael to oversee all of our business analytics as well. He is a crucial part of the mix between marketing and content and the decisions we make in all platforms of our business."

 

I wonder what the football people at OBD are thinking when they hear Brandon refer to football as "content".  That has to be irritating.  

[ndirish1978]

1 hour ago, YoloinOhio said:

I assume a lot of people do subscribe, though. So why not discuss the article? 

 

Fair enough, you can rip on me for it, but the vast majority of boards I'm on don't allow this for the simple reason that shills for paid sites come in and start topics linking to paid articles. 

[JohnBonhamRocks]

Let's hire one of those guys that do the red light, yellow light, green light away from the Eagles. 

 

I think next year he can handle all three lights. 

[SDS]

7 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

 

Fair enough, you can rip on me for it, but the vast majority of boards I'm on don't allow this for the simple reason that shills for paid sites come in and start topics linking to paid articles. 

 

Yeah the original poster joined 14 years ago so that he could shill for the Buffalo News at this very moment in time. ?

 

You have added nothing to this conversation with your complaints.  Go complain to the Buffalo news if you have an issue. 

[ndirish1978]

Just now, SDS said:

 

Yeah the original poster joined 14 years ago so that he could shill for the Buffalo News at this very moment in time. ?

 

You have added nothing to this conversation with your complaints.  Go complain to the Buffalo news if you have an issue. 

 

Bro that's not what I said. I said it was their reasoning, not mine. I'm not gonna die on this hill, it's your board, do what you want. FTR I'm not one of the people constantly complaining about the TBN paywall. 

[ricojes]

2 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

 

Bro that's not what I said. I said it was their reasoning, not mine. I'm not gonna die on this hill, it's your board, do what you want. FTR I'm not one of the people constantly complaining about the TBN paywall. 

i added key points from the article and changed the title as to not waste too much of the non-BN-subscribers time....

[ndirish1978]

Just now, ricojes said:

i added key points from the article and changed the title as to not waste too much of the non-BN-subscribers time....

 

Appreciate it. Sorry for coming off like a jagoff, you're well within your rights to post whatever you want and it's not my place to be a prick about it. 

[dave mcbride]

People! Simply register on the site. I registered months ago and can read everything, but not once has the News asked me for one thin dime.

[BuffaloRush]

This is fantastic.  So basically Beane is getting rid of the Bills analytics department because it really sounds they were weren’t offering much to the football side of things.

 

I remember back in 2013 when the Bills canned Chan Gailey.  Russ Brandon called a press conference on New Years Day to announce he was given the title of President - essentially taking the reigns from Ralph officially.  

 

He played to the fan base by talking about how it was a era and that the “new” Bills were going to be analytics driven.  He said the brand was tarnished and announced his plans to start the analytics department for football operations.  At the time this was the hot trend in the NFL, so fans were pumped.  Russ then announced the hiring of the director, Michael Lyons, who I believe worked at Kodak.  

 

But then he hired Doug Marrone, who while a competent coach, was not really one to use data to make decisions on the field.  He made this abundantly clear at his press conferences.  Of course the next coaching hire, Rex Ryan, also was not an analytics guys either

 

It made many wonder “what the hell are the analytic guys doing, if they aren’t that involved with coaches.”  Then a journalist asked Russ and he basically said they were involved with providing analytics for ticket sales on the business side of things.  This was the opposite of what Russ spoke of on New Year’s Day. 

 

I remember being very annoyed, because again, it was another interesting idea that the organization botched....yet again.  Im

not blaming Russ because who knows what happened, but man, another idea that didn’t nearly live up to its hype.

 

So I am all in favor of Beane building a new analytics department.  There was no reason for the department to be housed until football operations if they had little impact on the on field product.  

 

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2018/01/25/bills-axe-analytics-staff/

[Wayne Arnold]

Once I saw Marrone's game management decisions, I knew the "analytics department" was a hoax.

.

I blame Russ.

 

"Analytics! We're cutting edge! lol Just kidding, you guys, it's just for ticket sales lol"

 

 

 

Edited January 25, 2018 by Wayne Arnold

[BuffaloRush]

2 minutes ago, Wayne Arnold said:

Once I saw Marrone's game management decisions, I knew the "analytics department" was a hoax.

.

I blame Russ.

 

"Analytics! We're cutting edge! lol"

 

 

Right from the start it seemed bizarre to hire a coach that was anything but analytics-driven.  I think his intentions were good and he was trying be cutting edge, but in the end it really was a hoax, as you put it

[White Linen]

35 minutes ago, Wayne Arnold said:

Once I saw Marrone's game management decisions, I knew the "analytics department" was a hoax.

.

I blame Russ.

 

"Analytics! We're cutting edge! lol Just kidding, you guys, it's just for ticket sales lol"

 

 

 

 

I don't think Bills fans buy tickets because they're stupid and easily duped.  We're as smart of a fan base as any.  

[Paulus]

Too bad Russ has not been canned yet... Or, tarred and feathered by Bills' fans. 

 

I swear, that guy has dirt on someone. Or, he is an insanely good ass-suck. 

[Fadingpain]

This sort of thing represents the old Bills, the middling, crap organization that always half-assed it and achieved little in success for its history, save the glorious time around the Superbowl years.

 

I genuinely believe all that stuff is finally behind us and we are now a much more professionally run organization, by people who get it.

 

I still say things are looking up and, in fact, have not looked this good in a generation.

 

 

[LABILLBACKER]

1 hour ago, Wayne Arnold said:

Once I saw Marrone's game management decisions, I knew the "analytics department" was a hoax.

.

I blame Russ.

 

"Analytics! We're cutting edge! lol Just kidding, you guys, it's just for ticket sales lol"

 

 

 

Tell me Russ Brandon doesn't remind you of that creepy overzealous car salesman.

[Beast]

6 minutes ago, Fadingpain said:

This sort of thing represents the old Bills, the middling, crap organization that always half-assed it and achieved little in success for its history, save the glorious time around the Superbowl years.

 

I genuinely believe all that stuff is finally behind us and we are now a much more professionally run organization, by people who get it.

 

I still say things are looking up and, in fact, have not looked this good in a generation.

 

 

 

Preach it. I feel the same.

[KDIGGZ]

[Koko78]

Analytics are great for games like baseball, where you can keep track of in-depth stats like how a particular batter does against left-handed pitchers or a certain type of pitch.

 

So much of football isn't quantifiable. There are no stats as to whether a receiver ran the correct route on a play or whether a DB blew a coverage or was supposed to get safety help, for example. Others are misleading, such as interceptions or quarterback ratings (interceptions may or may not be the QBs fault, and ratings are only useful to generate a general estimate of efficiency over a long period of time.)

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

1 minute ago, Koko78 said:

Analytics are great for games like baseball, where you can keep track of in-depth stats like how a particular batter does against left-handed pitchers or a certain type of pitch.

 

So much of football isn't quantifiable. There are no stats as to whether a receiver ran the correct route on a play or whether a DB blew a coverage or was supposed to get safety help, for example. Others are misleading, such as interceptions or quarterback ratings (interceptions may or may not be the QBs fault, and ratings are only useful to generate a general estimate of efficiency over a long period of time.)

The tape doesn't lie

[Utah John]

22 minutes ago, LABILLBACKER said:

Tell me Russ Brandon doesn't remind you of that creepy overzealous car salesman.

I think he looks like that Joel whatever, the creepy TV evangelist.