BY ADAM GROSSMAN
You Have To Admit It’s Getting Better
Things are getting better. Three natural questions about this statement are: what are these “things” how are they getting “better?” and what does this have to do with sports sponsorship?
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
UMBC Positioned to Take Advantage of March Madness Success
The biggest star of the 2018 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament so far is Zach Seidel. Seidel, however, is not the “only” a star on the UMBC team. UMBC as an institution is the biggest winner of the NCAA Tournament so far, even more for what it has done off the court than on the court.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN AND BEN SCIAMBI
B6A Announces The Creation Of Its NBA Jersey Patch Index
Block Six Analytics (B6A) is pleased to announce the creation of the NBA Jersey Patch Index (JPI). The JPI uses B6A’s Media Analysis Platform (MAP) image valuation capabilities within its Social Sentiment Analysis Platform (SAP) to analyze the earned value of posts that feature a team’s jersey patch in pictures or videos for the 2017-18 season
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
Tokyo 2020 Already Secures Record Olympic Sponsorship Revenue In 2018
Olympic records are being set, but not just in Pyeongchang. It may be difficult to think about the 2020 Summer Olympics while the 2018 Winter Olympics are still happening, but the International Olympic Committee (IOC) stated that 2020 host city Tokyo has already secured almost $3 billion in sponsorship deals.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN & ROSS CHUMSKY
Brady, Smith Generate Highest Percentage Of Wins For Their NFL Teams
In the process of creating the Revenue Above Replacement (RAR) for the NFL for this season, our team at Block Six Analytics (B6A) identified the need to create a version of this on-field metric. RAR examines how an individual player generates revenue for a team based on his on field, off field, and personal performance. In the past, we relied on WAR or PER to create our models for the MLB and NBA, respectively.
To solve this problem for football, we used multiple data sets and multi-factor regression analysis. We were able to determine two main attributes that accounted for wins. In essence, these factors are how well (Grade) and how much (Snaps) did a player perform during the 2017 season.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
How Super Success Occurs In Super Bowl Advertising
Do Super Bowl television commercials work? It is the five-million dollar question facing companies looking to purchase advertising inventory during America’s most watched television event coming up on Feb. 4th. More specifically, do Super Bowl advertisements lead to incremental revenue growth?
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
Speaking the Same Language With Analytics
If there is one place where analytics should be settled science it is baseball. That is what makes a recent New York Times article titled “The Analytics Guy Failed to Compute One Thing: How to Be Accepted in Mexico” so surprising.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
Determining the Value of Brandwatch’s Football Sponsorship Analysis
In a post titled “Which Football Sponsors Get The Best ROI?,” Brandwatch examined the value created by kit (or jersey) partners over the past year on Twitter and Instagram. Its primary methodological flaw is that is only looking at the quantity of the images posted rather than the quality of posts with those images
BY BLOCK SIX ANALYTICS
David Falk Joins Block Six Analytics Advisory Board
Block Six Analytics (B6A) is excited to announce that David Falk has joined its Advisory Board after making an investment in the company. Falk will now take a leadership role in growing the company’s sports corporate partnership and player valuation offerings.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN & ROSS CHUMSKY
Aaron Judge, Mike Trout Rank As The Most Valuable Players In Baseball
Houston Astros second baseman Jose Altuve won the American League MVP Award this year while posting the highest batting average in the sport and leading his team to its first World Series title in franchise history. But from an economic standpoint, baseball’s most valuable player is Aaron Judge, who finished second to Altuve in MVP voting. Judge drives the most revenue for his team according to the Revenue Above Replacement (RAR) model developed by my firm Block Six Analytics (B6A).
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
What Cyber Monday Record Sales Means For Sports Organizations
For years, sports organizations have been investing millions of dollars in mobile technology with a particular focus on app development. One of the criticisms of this technology is that these investments are difficult to monetize. Cyber Monday shows this is increasingly not the case.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
AI Makes Humans More Intelligent
Humans can now learn disruptive practices from machines rather than machines “waiting” for disruptive ideas to come from humans. Computers can think “outside of the box” (even though the machines are often contained in boxes) because they do not think like humans. Humans can and should leverage the power of machines to come up with disruptive ideas to gain competitive advantages.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN AND JOSH HERZBERG
Judging the Success of Pepsi’s Newest Athlete Endorsement
It has been a whirlwind ride for New York Yankees outfielder Aaron Judge. From setting a new rookie homerun record to leading his team to the playoffs to unanimously winning the American League Rookie of the Year award, Judge has had a terrific year. His on-field success has helped translate into off-field partnership opportunities with companies including Rawlings, Under Armour, and Fanatics. It seemed like a no-brainer for PepsiCo (full disclosure: PepsiCo is a Block Six Analytics (B6A) client) to take a swing on an endorsement deal with Judge announced on Monday.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
How the Astros and Cubs World Series Titles Apply to Evaluating Sponsorship
The Houston Astros and Chicago Cubs demonstrate that there is not a single way for teams to win in baseball. Both teams rely heavily on analytics, and the data shows that each team should take a different approach in building their rosters. What is the lesson learned for buyers and sellers of sports sponsorship with this analysis?
BY ADAM GROSSMAN, ALEX CORDOVER, ALBERTO RIOS & JOSH HERZBERG
B6A Adds Optical Character Recognition To Its Media Analysis Platform
Block Six Analytics (B6A) is pleased to announce the addition of optical character recognition (OCR) capability to our Ensemble Training Process (ETP) within our Media Analysis Platform. Adding OCR to our best-in-class logo detection in MAP increases the overall accuracy and speed needed to identify the time, location, prevalence, and value of images in videos and photos for specific brands for specific activations.
BY ADAM GROSSMAN
Interview With NFL Network Analyst and Game Theory and Money Podcast Co-Host Cynthia Frelund
Cynthia Frelund joined NFL Network in 2016 as an analytics expert, providing her unique insight into the game on NFL Fantasy LIVE and GameDay Morning. She is also the co-host of the Game Theory and Money podcast. Prior to joining the NFL, Cynthia worked at ESPN and Disney. She graduated with a Masters of Business Administration and Masters in Predicative Analytics from Northwestern University.