Last updated 17:14 ET

I’m at the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston where the hype around data and analytics in sport is a little unnatural. But wonderful.

The first panel this morning looked at In Game Innovations – Genius or Gimmick?

The presence of Nate Silver on the panel would have assured a standing-room only crowd all on his own, but with Bill James added to the lineup at the last minute it was no surprised that they moved the event to the largest room in the place. No small thing to do, given the presence of NFL quarterbacks Andrew Luck and Matt Hasselback on the panel being bumped to the smaller room.

James is the darling of all things in sports analytics, the man fondly regarded as the father of modern baseball thinking. Billy Beane, the famed Moneyball manager of the Oakland A’s, and Theo Epstein (the Red Sox GM who brought Boston their first World Series in 86 years) are both disciples of Jamesian thinking and with analytics departments now seen as standard across baseball and indeed most US professional sports franchises the impact of the large, grey-bearded man from Kansas will be felt forever.

The theme of the talk was around innovation in sports, both in terms of on-field tactics and in terms of how sports are structured. To the European ear some seemed odd – after all, why should teams be so risk-averse in the US when there’s no relegation.

Kevin Kelley was also on the panel, along with NBA GM Daryl Morey and NBA coach George Karl. Kelley is an interesting character, the man behind the “no punt” high school team. That’s right, Kelley’s teams simply don’t punt on 4th down. They go for it every time.

Bill James said it was one thing about a team being stuck on their own 20 and not punting, but when he saw his Kansas City Chiefs punting from the 45 it drove him crazy. Kelley then corrected the great man, saying that based on the numbers he’s seen it actually makes more sense to to the opposite to that because punting from the 45 drastically changes the likelihood of the opposition scoring on the next possession.

James took the point, nodding sagely.

And a voice* whispered behind me:

“Wow – it’s not often someone schools Bill James”.

It’s that kind of place.

* possibly from a well known NBA front office person who will remain unnamed

—update—

So, it’s been a long day already. That’s how it is at Sloan. Kind of like a music festival – nip into a talk, see if it hooks you. If it does, stay. If not, move on. Far too many interesting people here to get stuck in a room listening to people roll out clichés.

The Man & Machine panel was well put together, and well moderated. NFL referee Mike Carey provided the “man” side, Hank Adams (Sportvision) and Paul Hawkins (Hawk-Eye) the machine with Michael Bantom and Dan Brooks representing the worlds of basketball and baseball, albeit from fairly different angles.

The contrast between how different sports have adopted technological officiating assistance was stark, with the proactive vs reactive nature of that adoption explored. As good as the NFL has been at bringing in replay for different types of incidents, which Carey said has the effect of raising the standards of the officials, Adams asked the simple but pertinent question: why does the NFL not use technology to help with something as crucial as where the ball is supposed to be placed for each down? As part of the discussion that followed, Adams was asked if Sportvision actually adapt their line that appears on the viewers’ screens to match the (incorrect) call of the officials. Adams admitted that they did, then said that he’d never actually admitted that in public before.

The Soccer Analytics Panel (Beyond the 4-4-2) was good, with an obviously interested crowd, featuring Stephen Houston (formerly of Chelsea), Paul Neilson (Prozone), Robbie Mustoe (NBC sports) and Jim Pallotta, president of AS Roma.

The use of data in soccer and how it was made useful was fascinating, complete with an example of an unnamed top level team who are currently using data mined from Prozone to enable them to practice specific movements in training that lead to overloads. While Neilson naturally wouldn’t give any clues as to who the team might be, he was firm in saying that the tactic is in current use and is leading directly to goals.

From the TV analyst’s point of view, Mustoe said that they had access to huge amounts of Opta stats in studio but had to balance that with the very limited amount of time they had to talk about them as well as the avoiding confusing the viewer.

Popped in to the Analytics in Sports Business panel, moderated by co-founder Jessica Gelman. Held in the massive main ballroom this was one of those panels where the glimpses of insight were, in my opinion, too seldom found. This can be the nature of the “showbiz” panels, as they could be called, where without somebody on the stage willing to put the boot in things can be very “nice”. Or perhaps it was just me feeling a little low on caffeine. Willing to give the benefit of the doubt.

Patrick Lucey’s presentation on Automatic Formation Analysis was very good indeed, showing the potential for real time formation analysis and identification in soccer (and other sports). Lucey and his research group showed, like Kirk Goldsberry last year, what can be achieved when very smart people are given access to lots and lots of very good data.

Lastly, Jeremy Troy and Chris Tanck gave a short presentation on the NFL’s analytics platform built three years ago to “democratize” access to data across all 32 NFL teams. The NFL has been storing data for a long time now, everything from playing stats to Neilsen ratings, and putting it in a very large data warehouse. Tapping into that data seemed like a natural thing to do, providing a front end that teams could use easily along with integrated access to all-22 video. It’s impressive stuff, but perhaps the most impressive aspect was that the league had taken such an initiative in the first place. Data and the use of same is still seen by many as a competitive advantage. Perhaps there is a parity desire at work here, saving some franchises from themselves. The league is thinking about making the APIs/Web Services available outside the 32 teams. A bold move, but if they do it you can bet that the NFL will have done its maths and seen that it would make financial sense.

And as I walked back to the media room some kind soul who I met last night gave me a copy of their book, pre-release. Tip of the cap to you, sir. I look forward to the read.