Reboot Spotlight: Hitting Reports
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This is the first post in a series I am trying out: Reboot Spotlight- where I have others at Reboot talk about their work.
I recently sat down with Jacob Howenstein, one of our Senior Biomechanists, to dive into updates he has made to our industry leading hitting reports.
The following is a recap of those updates.
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When Jacob started building Reboot’s hitting reports at the end of 2022, he knew he had to rethink our previous work.
At the time, our hitting reports mirrored what we built for pitching. And while some of the goals are similar (maximize momentum in the pitching hand/bat) there are significant differences in the constraints of each task.
Specifically, the combination of 1) fewer movements to analyze and 2) the reactionary nature of hitting, mandates that context plays a larger role in any analysis. And providing that context, so coaches can get their questions answered quickly and move on, is non-negotiable.
Daily Reports
Below is Jacob offering a quick summary of our reports. I love how he not only breaks down the biomechanist’s view, but also ties the reports directly to what a coach may take to the field.
As these reports become more and more ingrained in our partners’ daily workflow, we are lucky enough to get constant feedback on how we can make them more actionable.
We took that feedback to heart and made the following changes for the start of the 2024 season:
The ability to compare (red) apples to (green) apples. Hitting is reactionary by nature. While no two situations are identical, we want to offer as much context as possible. Now, coaches can group situations by speed and location so they can best work through their hypotheses.
Longer duration analysis. We increased our animation window, capturing the entire loading and stride phases of the swing, while also allowing coaches to view the path of the sweet spot through contact.
Easy access to videos. We always sought to give coaches multiple ways to view a swing- 360 degree aviators, data heavy charts, etc. This year we added the ability to easily reference game footage (via baseball savant) so coaches can easily bounce back and forth.
Aggregate Reports
Due to the limited number of movements a hitter has on a nightly basis, in addition to our daily reports, we deliver aggregate reports that offer coaches a wider view:
Similar to the daily reports, the bulk of what Jacob discussed above was core to our deliverables last year. However, we added three key things based on partner feedback:
MLB Averages. Reboot’s default is to compare each athlete to their optimal self, not others. However, we heard a desire to add context by showing MLB averages, and we now include that in multiple sections.
Swing Paths. This is a brand new section that can be used both for player development and advanced scouting (see: scouting the enemy). Listen below to how Jacob breaks down this report.
Trends. Similar to what we have on the pitching side, we added another view that provides an even wider lens- season trends. Jacob explains below how coaches can use this section to check on fatigue, strength and conditioning changes, or specific goals they are working on with the athlete.
Biomechanics at Scale
Reboot’s mission is to enable large organizations to excel in biomechanics at scale. Doing that means arming those in the arena.
We do this with our biomechanics pipeline, delivering skeletal data and momentum and energy metrics to biomechanists and analysts.
And Jacob ensures we do it with actionable reports for coaches.
So if you’re a coach, or if you work in the front office and are looking to help your coaches, reach out and see if we can help.