Live Blog: NYC Bloomberg Sports Event

11:30pm – I have arrived in New York City at Bloomberg headquarters for a MLB presentation about a new stat tracking software in development.  The event is scheduled to begin around 12pm and will go until almost 5pm with lunch somewhere in between.  Once it begins and I have an idea of the schedule, I will let you know.  I hope to do a live blog at intervals throughout the event to let everyone know what all the hype is about.  Stay tuned!

Here is a quick preview of some literature they gave us.  The photos are a bit shiny…it is very bright in here!:  DSCF5971.JPG

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12:00pm – I am in a room filled with Testosterone…lol  Wait, I justed spoted one other women; she is sitting at my table now in an effort to combat all the male hormones flying about.  Wish us luck!  Awaiting opening remarks…

12:05pm – Count now, 3 women and approximately 97 men.  Currently sitting next to two Mets bloggers who have agreed to a truce for the next 5 hours.  After that, all bets are off ;o)

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2:18pm – Opening remarks included bathroom locations, parking validation and Twitter info – ya know, the important stuff :O)

12:25pm – This project is an exclusive partnership with MLB Advanced Media to analyze baseball stats for their fantasy leagues.  We have been invited today to give feedback on the product and give suggestions to improve this new tool.

12:28pm – Bloomberg is dedicated to achieving in Sports what they have in the financial world; Providing valuable, complelling analysis tools with improvement on going.

12:33pm – There will be 2 products; the consumer product is geared towards Fantasy Baseball.  The Pro product is for MLB Team to use to analyze players.  Consumer roll-out is 2/18/10, when pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training.

12:42pm – Consumer product presentation: Will have a Draft Kit, News Product and In-Season Tool Kit.  These work in conjunction with any Fantasy Sport league like CBS, Fox or ESPN.  You can adjust roster spots, points, etc…  If there are particular areas you wish to focus on when picking players, the tool will sort players by whatever you specify.  Ex:  Sort by infielders high in home runs and steals.  You can save searches / lists for later.

12:47pm – You can set up “watch” lists and “exclude” lists.  For example, you hate the Red Sox…you can exclude all of their players from your draft, or just one or two players.  You decide.  It is like a filing cabinet for players; you pick the drawers and file them accordingly.

12:51pm – There are different screen views for different tastes; you can see a “baseball card” type view, a grid loaded with stats…all without switching pages.  You can also chart stats in graph form to see specific stats over a period of time.

12:55pm – Charts are available to track which positions are in higher demand during each round of the draft.  This will help you decided whether to draft a certain position or player earlier or later in the round and the odds of that person being available.

12:28pm – The In-Season tool helps you see trends for each player, how they perform against certain teams, certain pitchers, during certain months, etc…  Nice :O)

1:01pm – You can chart multiple players against each other based on avergage, homers, doubles, etc…  Color coding shows where players fall against the rest of the league (top 10%, etc…).  You can set your own benchamarks too; Ex: choose MLB catchers with at least 50 AB’s and minimum of 12 against left handers and compare them.  You decide what you want to know…LOVE this feature!

1:09pm – Prices:  Draft kit: $19.95, In-Season kit: $24.95, Combo package: $31.95.  Pre-order on MLB.com, will be ready to go 2/18.

1:10pm – Lunch break…be back shortly!

2:00pm – Ok, to recap so far…this software gives you stats in REAL time.  That alone is mind-blowing compared to what MLB.com provides currently.  And you do not need to open 5 internet windows to find things and then pray you can reconcile all that data.  Plus, you can customize searchs to find the stat comparisons YOU want.  Loving it…

2:10pm – Tools will include news / blog feeds that use the program and stats to apply real-time information to current baseball events.  For example, trades will be discussed in reference to how that player will impact his new team, the league, how he will perform in certain parks, etc…

2:17pm – News sources, including blogs like this one, will be integrated into the application for users looking for the most current news information.

2:19pm – There is no mobile application right now, but Bloomberg is in discussions with MLB about adding this.

2:28pm – Q&A on the consumer product is over.  Looks like we will get a look at the Pro version shortly.

2:40pm – Pro version uses Biometric security log-in using fingerprints!  Move over CIA…

2:42pm – Bloomberg has added a scouting application for teams to use; they can create a file for each player and report directly into the program.  Teams will be able to customize this to meet their specific needs.

2:45pm – Teams can analyze individual players on a number of levels.  For example, what percentage of the time will a low, inside pitch get a batter out?  This will tell you. Teams can print out these stats before the game and be able to advise the pitcher what to throw to that batter. It will also tell them where to put on shifts, where to place fielders, etc…

2:54pm – They are working with MLB on linking data to video feed as well; teams can highlight pitches on a spray chart they want to see video of and it will cue it up automatically.

3:00pm – There is SO much data available on this thing…I think my head may explode!  Wow…to imagine it, think of the most complicated, picky small details you would want to know about and then imagine it is possible to see the result in seconds.  It IS possible with this software; amazing!

3:02pm – Ok, so it may not be possible to conjure up a stat on how many days a player will wait to wash his lucky socks….but, it comes pretty close to that ;o)

3:08pm – Desert break; they are bribing us with Brownies ;o)

3:25pm – Still munching…but the wrap-up is upon us.  A few more details are coming…

3:32pm – Salary information may be rolled into the Pro version later.

3:35pm – The product is available only for baseball right now but may roll out for other sports in the future.  Signing off for now…will be back later with more info and commentary on the day’s events.  Thank you everyone for stopping by to join me today! 

One comment

  1. raysrenegade

    Jenn,
    I am jealous, and not because you are with the Mets fans.
    I really wanted to hit that event, but being down here in FL, getting to NYC would be extremely difficult….. not impossible, but financially difficult.
    The software looked amazing online, and can just think of how it would work daily and in comparision to match-up pitcher to batters……Not going to say it will revolutionize anything yet…..but it is a great step in the right direction.
    Hope you have a great time, and will be looking forward to your next post!

    Rays Renegade

    http://raysrenegade.mlblogs.com

    Reply

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