Last Friday the National Hockey League officially debuted their “enhanced statistic” database. This database comes from the NHL’s new partner with SAP as they plan to create a statistics mecca for the hockey world.
A plethora of statistical data has been provided to fans through this website. Along with the statistics is an informational section to educate fans about the league’s statistics and their definitions (and inform all fans who learned enhanced statistics prior to the NHL’s intervening of their new names). And of course, the NHL provided those working on hockey analytics for years the validation of their hard work— especially when the NHL worked with those analytics experts when deciding what should be included in the official statistic database.
Currently though, this new website is geared towards the casual fan, but not the analytics fanatics. So the existing data-driven, analytical loving power fans may continue to get their data elsewhere, rather than conceding to the simpler setup created by the NHL now.
The most controversial issue regarding the database: the NHL taking something that analytics experts have already been working on for years. Basically the NHL changed the name and essentially claimed to have built this even though it was discovered years before. While the NHL deserves credit for actually executing their own database, the feeling among those who created and executed their own analytics websites over the past few years is that the league did not truly accomplish this on their own— thus they are not solely deserving of full credit.
Chris Foster, the NHL’s director for digital business did not take sole credit, saying websites like War on Ice inspired the league— “They really are the pioneers. They started this conversation. They are the ones, who—listen, any time anybody’s talking about hockey, that’s a good thing. They brought a whole new analysis, a whole new understanding to the game, and we’re tremendously influenced by what they were doing. And we’re not trying to replace them by any means. All we’re trying to do is…we know that there’s stats out there now.”
However, Foster did say that he thought zone starts (the percentage of times a player begins his shift in the offensive zone versus the neutral zone) were completely new in that same interview. Yet, zone starts have been used in hockey analytics for years. So while the acknowledgement of inspiration betters the situation, claiming to create something that another website has already done and “basically cop the idea behind it with enough changes to avoid a lawsuit, slap an NHL logo at the top.”
The National Hockey League may have rushed into the release of the database. Faults range from the ridiculousness of a 37-algorithm to predict playoff series with an 85% success rate, to the inability of indicating any efficacy of utilizing these enhanced statistics when analyzing teams. Maybe it would have been more beneficial for the NHL to further test this system prior to its release, rather than releasing a product with some faults.
Releasing this statistic website was just the start of the NHL and SAP’s revolution of hockey. Prior to teaming up with the NHL, SAP formed partnerships with the NBA and NFL. Through SAP’s “HANA” database, statistics have been computed faster than ever before. Statistics are updated through this system nightly during games. NHL Chief Operating Officer John Collins spoke of the league’s new partnership with SAP— “Hockey is extremely fast-paced with very little stoppage in play, which results in many aspects of the game failing to show up in the box score… In partnering with SAP and using its best-in-class SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud service, we are now able to capture data points like never before and present existing and new statistics in a visually appealing way.
Planning for an April 2015 release, the NHL and SAP intend to create stat visualizations and stat search filtering engine.
Stat visualizations will include line-graph charts, to allow viewers to visualize the numbers of a particular stat category. Both the dates and the statistics will be chartered on the axes of the line-graph. Up to three players can be visually charted at one time. Any three players can be selected at once for the visualization.
Also expected this April is a 37-algorithm system to predict playoff series. When testing this system against fifteen years of playoff results the accuracy was compiled to an 85% success rate. Predictions for single playoff games, along with the series as a whole will be predicted by this system. The match ups will be analyzed to establish which team has an advantage in which category. While there are many critiques of this system (see above), its benefits include deeper analysis of each matchup and establishing which team has the edge.
[fanmob id=”b0370f8d-bfbf-4cce-9b69-7ac18fd8d279″]
SAP senior research scientist Eric Blabac described the prediction system “We’re taking a game and giving a win probability to either team. That’s based on a lot of regular-season factors, along with in-series factors that change within it, like are the teams home/away, how many time zones are they traveling, what are they doing the last five games, the last 15 games, things like that.”
The next phase is set for the premier of the 2015-2016 NHL season. Along with further innovations to their already released technology, the league plans to introduce player-tracking statistics. Player-tracking will bring live real-time game tracking of the game, similar to what was available during the 2015 NHL All-Star Game. Also, player-tracking will provide more in-depth statistics, including speed of shots, speed of skating, and distance traveled.
The digitizing of every NHL box score dating back to 1917 is to be included in SAP and NHL’s revolution. The searchable database is expected to be completed by 2016. Although not every statistic from every game is available, since assists were not always counted, nor were shots on goal or plus/minus. As well as being a text-based archival database, the league is working to categorize every goal from every game available on film. Those videos can then be linked from the statistics page. By 2016, the NHL plans to have every single goal since 2007 linked through stats pages and available in a collection.
What else does the future hold for the NHL and SAP? 3-D digital recreations of NHL games in real time. Similar to EA Sports’ NHL series, games will be recreated to be rewound, paused, and analyzed. It is likely that this will be a subscription service, possibly a second-screen experience to NHL Gamecenter.
“The League is embracing the opportunity that has been there and the void that has been identified for a long time.’ We’re just there now at an acceptable level. I think the potential is limitless. The potential to use the stats to let people connect better with their favorite players and teams, to better understand the strategy of the game, the ability to see more broadly trends across the League.” says NHL COO John Collins. “I’m excited to see how good and how far this technology revolution takes the game. I think it is one of the bigger, best things we’ve done since I’ve been here, and I think we’ve done a lot of good things.”
All of the innovations executed by the NHL and SAP may require implements along the way, but have incredible potential for a successful collaboration of technology and hockey. Although there has been noise regarding the actual effectiveness and application of enhanced statistics, without experimenting and actually thinking analytically their usage is inconclusive. By endorsing and expanding the availability of advanced statistics, the NHL is giving analytics the opportunity to flourish in its sport.