There’s a classic Simpsons episode in which the sly businessman Mr. Burns recruits real Major League Baseball players to join his company softball team in order to win a bet. But when the championship is on the line, Mr. Burns pulls eight-time National League all-star Darryl Strawberry for a substitute, Homer Simpson.
“You’re a left-hander, and so is the pitcher. If I send up a right-handed batter, it’s called playing the percentages,” Mr. Burns says to Strawberry. “It’s what smart managers do to win ballgames.”
High-level baseball is very mathematically-driven, with teams hiring dozens of data engineers to study granular statistics that can inform managerial decisions. But like Mr. Burns in that Simpsons episode, it’s tempting to overanalyze baseball statistics to the point of absurdity.
The Oakland Ballers, an independent Pioneer League baseball team, took that concept of “playing the percentages” to the next level: they let an AI manage the team for a game.
The Ballers were founded by edtech entrepreneur Paul Freedman as a salve to the departure of the beloved Oakland A’s, the Major League baseball team that owner John Fisher ripped away from local fans in what’s regarded as one of the most insidious managerial moves in sports history. Though they’re not a Major League team, the Oakland Ballers – coyly, the Oakland B’s – established an unprecedented national community of fans who rallied around the team in protest of the A’s departure. After just two seasons, the Ballers just won Oakland’s first baseball title since 1989.
“The Oakland Ballers uniquely have the experience of being like a major league team in a minor league market,” Freedman told TechCrunch. “We can have creative flexibility. We can play with things and experiment with things way before the MLB or NBA or any of those leagues could do something.”
Minor league baseball organizations are often called upon to test new technology …