tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post3618077122015917458..comments2023-11-05T04:16:44.937-05:00Comments on Advanced Football Analytics (formerly Advanced NFL Stats): New NFL.com Stat VizUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-10275393377484301222013-02-28T15:38:08.472-05:002013-02-28T15:38:08.472-05:00There are two cases where I think visualization re...There are two cases where I think visualization really helps:<br /><br />In the first, you have recurring metrics and you can see how they change over time and compare them. For football, I'd like to see metrics year by year or even game by game for players of the same position. Take a concrete example where you show each quarterback's passer rating (a horrible stat, but bear with me) for each regular season game over the past three years. You have 3 * 16 * 32 datapoints all on a single chart! Compare that chart with the NFL.com visualization for discovering who's been a better player lately.<br /><br />The other case is where you are trying to find something interesting in a mountain of data and a visualization can help pinpoint some interesting tidbits. Sometimes interesting stuff is found in unlikely places. In the NFL.com viz you have to select the players you're going to compare.<br /><br />I'd say this NFL.com viz is cool but functionally not very useful. However, I wouldn't write off all visualization as a total loss.Davidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-14687070023345871922013-02-28T00:42:37.711-05:002013-02-28T00:42:37.711-05:00I'm not named Ian, but I agree with the other ...I'm not named Ian, but I agree with the other comments.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00229981018680117757noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-17905729710185181052013-02-26T15:43:11.627-05:002013-02-26T15:43:11.627-05:00@ian
I agree with that. We spend far too long at ...@ian<br /><br />I agree with that. We spend far too long at my office trying to make interactive visuals because mangers see a good bit of analysis summed up with a suitable vis and think that the vis is the way forward.<br /><br />They don't seem to realise the analysis behind the numbers is not something that can be generalised. Each problem requires specific techniques, and similarly the best vis is different every time.Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-50011250328114602922013-02-26T14:16:07.328-05:002013-02-26T14:16:07.328-05:00My opinion is that the interactive visualization o...My opinion is that the interactive visualization obsession in tech/business/[the stat community] is a pretty big waste of time. People are just visualizing for the sake of it. I think it's taking good stat guys away from what they do best (torturing the data for truth), and it's enriching tech companies that put together cool looking but ultimately pointless software.<br /><br />I think there's a place for visualization, but 9 times out of 10 an excel chart will be simpler and more understandable.<br /><br />On the radar chart: I'm not a fan because there's no sense of which stats are most important, and the area inside the lines is meaningless. Imagine one quarterback who is good at a bunch of generic stats on a radar chart but is bad at any/a. He might have a great area but he's actually a bad QB.Ianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07024027510665968270noreply@blogger.com