HoS: Kyle Boddy

If you’re a baseball fan, you’ve probably heard of Driveline founder Kyle Boddy. If not, here’s your intro to one of the most revolutionary figures in sports, and a great podcast guest to boot.

Kyle’s revolution is taking the Moneyball hunt for market inefficiency to the realm of improving players. After demonstrating an impressive proof of concept with pitching and hitting, he’s taking his storied abilities into the other major sports.

Outline from the astute Sam Schuette…

1. Revolutionary changes in sports

   1. Manu Ginobili’s Eurostep

   2. How much is tradition worth following?

   3. Can AI find new strategies that haven’t been tapped into?

2. Making sports less enjoyable by optimizing it

   1. It pays for batters to play “boring”

   2. How to look for the glitch and exploit it

3. What teams miss when they solely focus on big-name prospects and not undrafted players

   1. If you’re great, throw it right down the middle

   2. Why it’s un-American to ignore the under-the-radar players with untapped potential

4. What variables separate good organizations from bad organizations?

   1. The importance of purpose and direction

5. Why Heat Culture is so prominent

   1. How they hold their players accountable while other teams do not

   2. Does the player-driven league limit accountability?

6. What constitutes good hitting?

   1. Bat speed vs. smash factor vs. swing decision

   2. What people misunderstand about the key to good hitting

7. Applying baseball sports science concepts to basketball

   1. What Hawkeye player tracking can reveal that Second Spectrum cannot

   2. Why basketball is harder to analyze than baseball and football

8. Secrets to pitching improvements

   1. The role of overload-underload training in increasing pitch speed

9. Should you really keep your eye on the ball?

   1. What recent research shows about how hitters make contact without looking at the ball

10. What kids’ love for video games reveals about players’ love for their sport

    1. The importance of immediate feedback in video games and sports training

    2. Making a player’s improvement into a quantifiable video game

    3. Telling someone they’re getting better isn’t enough unless there’s data to support it

11. The importance of having a coach who wants it as bad as the player

    1. Proving your worth through work ethic

    2. What Kyle learned from Reds pitcher Michael Lorenzen