[Badminton, credit to Pixabay]

The global sports analytics industry is expected to reach a value of USD 12.69 billion by 2029, according to a recent report from Research and Markets. 

The industry began to come under the limelight in earnest in 2019, and has made tremendous progress, growing to USD 1.79 Billion in 2021. 

Numerous jobs come under the classification of sports analytics such as sports trading analyst, partnership strategy, athlete content manager, physical therapist, and personal coach. 

The origin of this field is considered to begin in the early  2000s, with the Oakland Athletics, the lowest ranked team in MLB, which formed a team through thorough data analysis, resulting in a significant improvement in performance on a miniscule budget.

After this tremendous event, currently, every single professional team has a team and data analyst to efficiently prepare the game against every team.

In the past, errors often occurred because humans directly stored and calculated data, but now that the era of machines and code has arrived, more accurate analysis has been made possible.

There are two main merits of sports analysis.

First, Sports analysis finds strengths and weaknesses of teams and players by analyzing sports games, individual players conditions and records, and the team’s performance in detail. 

Teams and organizations can track performance with data, predict outcomes, and make more informed choices on the field.

The article, “How Sports Analytics Are Used Today, by Teams and Fans” written by Alyssa Schroer, argues for a positive perspective of embracing statistics into Sports.

Players, coaches, and even fans can forecast the outcome of a certain play or game with the technique of incorporating statistics into mathematical models. 

While front offices utilize analytics to emphasize player development, coaches rely on it to research opponents and maximize play calls in games. 

For example, the NBA has introduced the world to a system called Player Tracking.

This system evaluates player movement and determines the team's abilities and efficiency, as the name would imply.

The player's speed, stealth, minutes played, passes made during the game, and overall possession are all recorded by numerous cameras. 

The NBA's main website makes these analyses available to the public.

Citizens can also participate in analyzing players without difficulty, and their ability to analyze sports improves as a result. 

The importance of sports analytics seems to be increasing as players and coaches seek out  whatever statistical advantage they can get.

The second advantage of sports analytics is how it plays a significant role in giving fans information about fantasy sports and sports betting out of the field. 

For instance, if someone has a favorite sports team, they can predict future games  via sports analysis. 

The fundamental draw of sports is how nobody can guarantee the end result of the game before it actually ends, no matter how much sports analysis is done. 

Yet, if  the fans consider match predictions based on the players' data, they will have more affection for the team and sport.

Additionally, people who find sports hard to access can easily be drawn to becoming a fan through the analysis of the game.

They will be able to more easily understand and find their favorite team by looking at the analysis of the player or sport rather than blindly watching the game without knowing anything about the sport.

However, there are, of course, drawbacks to such analysis.

To explain, when these evaluations are performed, numerous criteria are taken into consideration so that decisions, such as the one to keep or release a player, can be challenging for team owners and coaches. 

The team may become unbalanced as a result of the data's forecasts, making the handling of circumstances more challenging.

Other scientific measures, such as mental coaching or emotion control, can be developed to prevent the weakness of the tools that are used these days.

If these weaknesses are compensated for, it is expected that sports analysis will develop much in the future to create more opportunities for jobs and accurate analysis.