{"id":1007,"date":"2019-11-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-11-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/how-data-and-analytics-are-driving-decision-making-in-baseball-and-banking\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T05:12:26","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T05:12:26","slug":"how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/","title":{"rendered":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n\t
\n\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\n\t\t\t\t
\n \n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

\n Nov 26, 2019 <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>Articles<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n \n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n
Category<\/div>\n Data & Innovation<\/a> <\/div>\n
\n
Share<\/div>\n Facebook<\/a>\n Twitter<\/a>\n Email<\/a>\n Copy Link<\/a>\n
https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n
\n
\n
\n
\n

To make a difference you must first understand those to whom you are providing data.<\/p>\n \n \n \n

\n

\u201cI bet you didn\u2019t think you\u2019d be talking to a banker today!\u201d jokes Ameet Shetty.<\/h4>\n
\n

By John Portch<\/h6>\n

\u201cI was coming to this summit and wondering why would anyone in this room want to hear from a banker.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shetty, who until recently served as the Chief Data & Analytics Officer of the Atlanta-based SunTrust Bank, is speaking to an audience at the 2019 Leaders Sport Performance Summit at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in June.<\/p>\n

Moments earlier he had still been backstage chatting enthusiastically with his fellow panellist, Ryan Murray of the Texas Rangers, and had seemingly been persuaded of his own relevance to proceedings.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs I start to think about it there are a lot of correlations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Murray, the Rangers\u2019 Director of Baseball Analytics, and Shetty had been invited to delve into data-driven decision-making at their respective organisations.<\/p>\n

The rationale is clear in the case of baseball, which is still viewed as that most data-driven of sports, but what of banking? In explanation, Shetty takes the audience back to the 2008 financial crisis and Lehman Brothers, whom he says met its demise due to its seeming disregard for data analysis.<\/p>\n

\u201cLehman Brothers couldn\u2019t make their trades in minutes and change their positions to survive the day because they hadn\u2019t invested in analytics,\u201d he explains. As a point of comparison, Shetty offers Goldman Sachs, who not only survived the crisis but continues to thrive today. \u201cThe story for banking wasn\u2019t just that analytics is something you need to invest in for the fun of it, this is surviving \u2013 it\u2019s the difference between being able to stay on the journey or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a tweak or two, it might have been Murray uttering those last words. Instead, the man from the Rangers steers the conversation towards the latest \u2018cycle of innovation\u2019 with baseball. These days it\u2019s not Moneyball or the various reams of data available on StatsCast that occupies thoughts in the clubhouses of Major League Baseball.<\/p>\n

\u201cTeams are still using StatsCast,\u201d Murray admits, \u201cbut the real push for innovation is starting to kick up. Some teams call them \u2018sports science\u2019 but it\u2019s really about unique data generation, whether you build products yourself or you find third parties.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s finding those products that are really going to make your team better and, in doing so, probably depriving other teams of that same advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Shetty, who is now the Chief Data & Analytics Officer at McDonald\u2019s, and Murray have been instrumental in building analytics departments at their organisations and this is the story of how data and analytics have become indispensable decision-making tools in the worlds of banking and baseball.<\/p>\n

\u2018We don\u2019t want to sit in an ivory tower\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest challenge is that people don\u2019t want to break the bottles that they have \u2013 their gut intuition,\u201d continues Shetty.<\/p>\n

\u201cI heard this when I was talking to the Chief Marketing Officer at McDonald\u2019s [Silvia Lagnado] and she said \u2018I use data and analytics to check my intuition; I still check my intuition but I use it as one more information point\u2019 and you can usually convince most leaders. Most leaders are logical and sound in their thought process \u2013 they want to challenge themselves and give you that open door.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shetty cites the growth of artificial intelligence and machine learning across analytics in numerous industries and also explains that a relative few know how it is applied. \u201cEven those that have it in their organisation, a lot of them have been doing it a certain way for 20 years. The hardest thing is how you get someone to take 20 years\u2019 experience in their industry, that knows that space, that hears everything moving; they won\u2019t really want to change the way they are.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen you\u2019ve got young talent coming out of college \u2013 how do you blend them together?\u201d This has been a key focus for Shetty who wants veteran bankers to keep reinventing themselves. \u201cWe make sure we have programmes and expected training that they go through and we make sure our leadership understands the impact they have on those teammates and how they see the company.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

During Shetty\u2019s 17 years at SunTrust, his initiatives have helped the analytics department grow from a modest 15 to a figure closer to 600 in 2019.<\/p>\n

Such numbers far exceed those of Texas Rangers, who has recently as 2014 employed just two analysts, starting with Murray himself. In the subsequent five years he has worked to develop the club\u2019s data \u2018assets\u2019, which, as he explains, requires a clear plan and an embedding of data analysts within each department of baseball operations.<\/p>\n

This process has seen Rangers analysts don uniforms in spring training or head out on the road with the team. As Murray says: \u201cWe want to embed people throughout the organisation. We don\u2019t want to sit in an ivory tower with email sending out spreadsheets and bar graphs. That\u2019s not compelling and it\u2019s not useful and we really want to make the biggest impact we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Be compelling\u2019 is a central pillar of Murray\u2019s department. \u201cIt\u2019s such an important part of what we do that it often gets overlooked. You can\u2019t get hand a stack of Excel sheets to a coach or slap it on his desk without any information because the next day when you walk in it\u2019s going to be in the garbage.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to understand how people learn, you have to understand what is compelling to them; data visualisations, having those conversations; making it a story that you can turn into actions and decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

SunTrust operates in a similar manner with its clients. \u201cWe spend a lot of time on education with our business partners; telling them what we can do, but we also need a bit more,\u201d explains Shetty. \u201cThey need to give us a little bit of insight into what they think is going to drive incremental growth for them or what it is they are trying to risk-avoid or what it is they think from an efficiency standpoint.\u201d He describes how prospecting with commercial lenders leads to \u201ccanned options and opportunities\u201d but that \u201cwe would never have figured out how to build the right models to help them figure out what are the best prospects to go after had we not gone and spent time in the front office.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always a two-way interaction but you have to have a culture where the business wants you there and the only way I know how to make that happen is to help them make money.\u201d<\/p>\n

The desired outcomes are equally blunt in baseball, where teams will be ultimately be judged on their win-loss record. Trust in analysts is earned gradually. \u201cBaseball is not an industry full of dummies,\u201d says Murray, \u201cwe\u2019re very smart people and it\u2019s evident that not only objective but subjective information is becoming more and more involved in our modelling, as is our predictive software.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe must use that to our advantage as opposed to ad hoc conversations or just an objective way of thinking about a problem; it\u2019s rigorously going through setting up your process and establishing the things you believe in, understanding how predictive they are and what they\u2019re good at. Getting to that point is so critical and it almost entirely comes from understanding \u2018this is what is going to make us better and take us to the next level\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing a trusted advisor, building up the level of trust that you have with your coaches, players, executives \u2013 the people who are making decisions based on the information you are providing for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

A typical scenario would be a veteran coach with a specific way of preparing for a game. \u201cSay they want a visual of the strike zone by batting average, a traditional nine-box zone\u201d Murray continues. \u201cMy first response is that it\u2019s not very predictive of anything. Let\u2019s actually break down into what the coach is trying to understand and how we can get to that goal. I might tell them that our internal metric, a combination of exit velocity and launch angle and hit direction, is much more predictive. You try to meet them on their plain and make it an ongoing conversation. If they ask \u2018why is this section highlighted red?\u2019 we can really open up a dialogue that allows you to do build that trust with the people who are ultimately making the decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Test and learn<\/strong><\/p>\n

Session moderator Steve Gera asks about inevitable anomalies, those moments when decisions are made in the face of the data. How would Shetty approach such scenarios? \u201cTest and learn,\u201d is his swift response, although he admits that at SunTrust he benefited from the trust of his employers and his clients. That may be harder to come by in sport but, \u201cyou\u2019ve got to take a little bit of trust but verify; you\u2019ve got to give it a chance to see if it works.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The message for sport is loud and clear and the Rangers are making inroads with the most important stakeholders, the players. \u201cIn spring training we have small group sessions with subsets of players; we\u2019ll take all the minor league pitchers and we\u2019ll go through the tools we use to evaluate them,\u201d says Murray. \u201cWe tell them about the things they do really well. Guys love hearing things that they do well; you lift them up in front of their teammates and you start getting some momentum going. We do those throughout spring training and as you get into the season we do meetings as part of every series we go through; we talk about all the matchup information, how best to beat the team we\u2019re playing that day.<\/p>\n

\u201cReally it just comes down to being present. In the past, there had never been an analyst who was down in the clubhouse being physically present for the guys to ask questions. You build those relationships that are so critical to help bridge the gap between objective and subjective decision-making.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Rangers are ahead of the game in many respects but Murray concedes that banking is still ahead of the game at the moment. \u201cWe\u2019re not at the point where we have AIs making decisions for our baseball teams yet we may be close. We\u2019re at the point where you need to have a learning culture where everyone is constantly trying to get better and to never get stuck in the way you\u2019re thinking because of the idea that \u2018this is the way it\u2019s been done\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to continue to iterate, innovate and be the best version of yourself, which means continuing to learn.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/div>\n \n \n \n <\/div>\n

\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking. To make a difference you must first understand those to whom you are providing data.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":152,"menu_order":0,"template":"","categories":[23],"pathway":[],"topic":[],"sport":[],"class_list":["post-1007","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-data-innovation"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHow Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking. To make a difference you must first understand those to whom you are providing data.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Performance Institute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-12-15T05:12:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"700\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"375\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/\",\"name\":\"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2019-11-26T00:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-12-15T05:12:26+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg\",\"width\":700,\"height\":375},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/\",\"name\":\"Performance Institute\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute","og_description":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking. To make a difference you must first understand those to whom you are providing data.","og_url":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/","og_site_name":"Performance Institute","article_modified_time":"2025-12-15T05:12:26+00:00","og_image":[{"width":700,"height":375,"url":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/","url":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/","name":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking - Performance Institute","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg","datePublished":"2019-11-26T00:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2025-12-15T05:12:26+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/08\/News-iRena-Featured-Image.jpg","width":700,"height":375},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-data-and-analytics-decision-making-baseball-banking\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"How Data and Analytics are Driving Decision Making in Baseball and Banking"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/#website","url":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/","name":"Performance Institute","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/article"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1007\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32335,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/1007\/revisions\/32335"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1007"},{"taxonomy":"pathway","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pathway?post=1007"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=1007"},{"taxonomy":"sport","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sport?post=1007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}