NEW YORK — The Arizona Diamondbacks could join the Tampa Bay Rays and a handful of other major league clubs using virtual reality in game preparation. Diamondbacks president and CEO Derrick Hall told the SportTechie podcast that VR could be the next big trend in baseball, as it offers a good way for the club’s hitters to prepare for opposing pitchers by getting a look at their deliveries, spin and movement from a batter’s box perspective.
“I think it’s going to become a big part of the preparation for each team as well,” Hall said. “I think we’re going to start seeing the installation of virtual reality downstairs in the clubhouses or in areas where you do have space available, so they can go in and prepare for [pitchers].”
Diamondbacks general manager Mike Hazen confirmed in a follow-up conversation at Citi Field that the club’s baseball operations department was in the “exploratory phase” of investigating how VR could help their hitters, with a growing realization that virtual reality could be “an opportunity from a visualization standpoint of getting to see the opposition and getting a feel for what guys may do.”
Hazen added, “It’s a tool, right? It’s like anything else, it’s not going to take over for all the things that we do in terms of the preparation for hitters or our game plans or advance scouting. Especially guys that haven’t been around the league a lot, it might give them more of a leg up facing guys for the first time.”
Even veteran hitters facing new pitchers or playing an interleague series against a rarely seen opponent can benefit. Often hitters in the on-deck circle will closely study a pitcher before a first at bat in hopes of gleaning insight about their individual pitch repertoires.
“You may be able to accomplish that earlier in the day and get yourself in a better mindset heading into that game,” Hazen said.
League-wide strikeout rates have increased every season since 2005 while scoring, homers and batting average had all been declining severely until an uptick in offense the past three seasons. Some have attributed those changes to the proliferation of advanced information around the sport; the additional data, video and scouting tends to help pitchers more than hitters, in large part because they initiate action and have more control over a game plan.
Arizona first baseman and National League MVP frontrunner Paul Goldschmidt said he had heard of teams looking into VR but that it wasn’t anything he had used.
“There’s so much stuff for the pitchers,” Goldschmidt said. “What can hitters do to try and catch up a little bit? That’s something I’ve heard floated, that this may be the next thing for hitters to [simulate] some at bats or see a [pitcher].”
Hazen emphasized that virtual reality itself wasn’t going to overcome that information disadvantage, noting that the onus still relies on each club’s hitting development program.
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“I still think the pitchers are probably going to be ahead with the amount of resources,” he said. “I don’t know how much this close that gap, if at all. Again, it’s more of a useful visualization tool and a way for hitters to feel more comfortable when they’re stepping in there for the first time.”
While speaking with Bram Weinstein on the SportTechie podcast, Hall also said that under the leadership of Hazen and Mike Fitzgerald, the director of research and development, the Diamondbacks have “fully embraced” analytics and the use of technology to enhance performance. He cited the club’s proprietary database, called Cobra, as one example of that effort.
Hall also noted that more players across the majors have been calling for an automation of the strike zone. On Tuesday, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred most clearly signaled his belief that it’s only a matter of time before the technology is good enough for so-called robot umpires. Manfred stopped short of calling their implementation inevitable, noting that the owners would need to have a conversation at that time about whether to proceed in that direction. Hall, on the other hand, is more enthusiastic in welcoming the idea.
“I think, if the technology is there, let’s use it,” Hall said. “I don’t think we’re there yet. So as we are not, let’s continue to rely on the human element here of the umpire. I love having an umpire behind home plate. If there’s going to be a way of doing both, that’s certainly going to help. And I think there will be, eventually, but we need to continue to try and create the technology that will enable us to do so and be very, very accurate in a way that’s not advantageous to the pitcher or the hitter. But I think we’ll get there, I really do. And I’m all in favor of it.”