Every move by quarterbacks Chris Merchant, Michael O’Connor, and Sonny Weishaupt at last month’s Canadian Football League scouting combine was tracked by Catapult wearables on their backs and every pass was recorded by Wilson sensors in the balls.
That data provided metrics such as fastest throw and quickest release time that were almost indistinguishable among the three, with separations of just 0.2 miles per hour and .02 seconds. Highest and average spin rates varied more, but those first two categories suggested similarities that evaluators at the CFL combine wouldn’t have seen using just the naked eye.
“They weren’t close to look at,” said Catapult senior applied sport scientist Jamie Hepner. “Their performances varied quite a lot.”
This was the first pro scouting combine at which the Wilson X-Pro Football—which has an accelerometer recording data at 100-hertz inside the ball—was used in conjunction with Catapult’s OptimEye S5, although the two technologies were also deployed in tandem at the 2017 Senior Bowl. NFL prospects have used the two systems in training but not at that league’s combine.
Hepner said that the best use of the throwing data was more for the tracking of longitudinal trends than the measurement of individual passes. He has been working as a consultant to pro and major college teams for the past four years and noted that spiral efficiency was a good example of a meaningful metric that can be invisible even to trained evaluators. Spiral efficiency assesses the difference between a ball’s axis of rotation and its direction of travel, with 100 meaning the two are perfectly aligned.
“By your eye, can you tell the difference between 91 and 86?” Hepner said. “I would argue no, but the data suggests that the likeliness of that play [succeeding] is impeded.”
Over time, baselines can be established for the minimum viability of a throw and profiles can be created for individual quarterbacks. The former concept helps with scouting and the latter with the design of offensive plays. Hepner noted, for example, how much the NFL’s Ravens changed their offense last season when Lamar Jackson replaced Joe Flacco. While those players have more obviously different skill sets, less pronounced differences could be detected with data.
Catapult began creating quarterback-specific biomechanics metrics a few years ago. The development team created an algorithm that could identify a particular accelerometer loading as a throw using the same device worn on the back of all other players. Hepner, however, said interest in this new schema was mixed. Coaches wanted more than just a fatigue monitor.
Wilson, on the other hand, had a ball that could track interesting information about its flight but not the identity of its thrower.
“A ball is a ball. It doesn’t know who’s doing what,” Hepner said. “The equipment guy throws the ball around, and does that get assigned to whoever? How do we differentiate?”
That led to a natural partnership of the two technologies whereby data is synced and connected. Catapult is the owner of XOS Digital—the leading digital video supplier to NFL teams—and the coded metadata of plays in that database could be untapped for future analysis.
Hepner said he filed a couple reports based on this data last year that reached the senior coaching staffs of NFL teams. While Zebra Technologies is the exclusive tracking technology during games, nearly 20 NFL organizations use Catapult in practice. Hepner believes that his company’s wearable device in combination with Wilson’s connected football can have a real impact.
“We had this piece that was a real cornerstone but it wasn’t in and of itself impactful,” Hepner said. “I say a lot that interesting data is completely useless to a coach. It has to actually change something that we do. Interesting is for fans. Impactful is for coaches.”