Sports Performance Measurement and Analytics: The Science of Assessing Performance, Predicting Future Outcomes, Interpreting Statistical Models, and Evaluating the Market Value of Athletes 1st Edition

While this book was required for one of my graduate courses, I have since re-read it on my own. There's nothing more refreshing than a clearly-written, informative book that doesn't make you feel dumb (no pretentious language and foreign concepts) or brilliant (no babying concepts down.)Segmented by concepts (variables, physiological, psychological, and statistics) followed by five major fields of sport, this book lays out the basic information you'll need and flows into the more complicated topics without being abrupt or confusing. As much as I wanted to seek the input of multiple reliable sources for my written work, I found a good amount of supportive information that I would need right here in this one book.It is incredibly difficult to write concisely, often times more difficult than meeting a lengthy requirement, but Dr. Martin has accomplished the task. I was knowledgable in a few sports, a complete novice in some (talking about you basketball), and had never applied analytics to any of them before - but I am confident enough, with this guide in hand, to tackle greater research in the sports analytics field.

After reading it I felt like I wanted my money back. 40% of the book explains different sports basic rules, 15% is code and graphs, 40% is a sports term glossary and the rest is actual analysis. This book is not worth $50. I feel cheated and wish I could get my money back. Do not recommend

This book is perfect for "newbie" sports performance analysts. I used this for my sports performance analytics course in Northwestern University. The author, Dr. Lorena Martin, does a great job of laying out concepts and ideas necessary to understand the types of statistical analyses done in different kinds of sports. The book starts out with anatomy and physiology, physical/biological measures required of athletes, psychological measures, and statistical models. Then, it delves into different kinds of sports explaining rules and regulations, athlete requirements/skills (physical, psychological, and cognitive), R coding, and graphs. I am a huge fan of statistics but not so much into sports. This book changed the way I saw sports and athletes. Now, when watching NFL games, soccer matches, etc., I am more in-tune with athletic prowess required, the beauty of the game, and measureable data that can be gathered and analyzed. Published in 2016, I appreciate the up-to-date information on peer-reviewed studies and statistical software/programming.

Whether you're a lifelong athlete, or a novice who seeks to learn more about sports analytics, this book will completely change the way you look at how your favorite game is played. This was recommended to me by a former professor, who suggested this book as a perfect introduction to understanding how to evaluate incoming NBA draft talent. I thought I knew a thing or two about the subject beforehand, but the author completely breaks down the physical AND psychological attributes required for success at every player position, across each of the major sports covered within the book (NFL, NBA, MLB, FIFA and ATP). Sports Performance Measurement and Analytics balances the combination of modern day data science with a Phil Jackson-like mentality, and redefines everything you thought you knew about the athletes you idolize.

For anyone interested in understanding sports performance, Dr. Martin does a great job of breaking it down into simple and easy to understand concepts. Her analysis of athletes from different sports and application of analytics in quantifying athletes’ performance allows readers to understand that one size doesn’t fit all. Breaking down performance attributes by speed, power, jumps, etc. provide tremendous insights into understanding what matters and how it is evaluated across different sports. The addition of data analysis in R gives insights into efficient approaches in application-based understanding of data. I’d recommend this book to anyone who is either new to sports performance, or wants to understand some fundamental parameters in quantification of players’ metrics.

This was the main text for a sports performance analytics course I took through Northwestern University. This book provides an introduction to sports analytics, with an emphasis in the early chapters on physiological and psychological measurements of athletes, an often overlooked area of study. Latter chapters look at sport-specific analytics (baseball, football, tennis, basketball, and soccer). R code is provided at the end of each of the sport-specific analytic chapters. For those with an interest in sports analytics, this book will provide you with a baseline to build on and begin to explore data sets for yourself.

This text is only a worthwhile read for true beginners. There's far too much filler, with page after page devoted to rules summaries and sport-specific historical information. The chapter on baseball is a particularly notable disaster.

As a sports scientist with a professional basketball team I found Dr. Martin's book a great tool. In a day and age where data seems to drive the machine of college and professional sports, it's more important than ever to have a solid grasp of what the data is telling us, and how best to use that data to your, and your team's, advantage. This book can help you wade through the confusion and make sense of the numbers that can overwhelm us at times.