Tufts Blogs

I don’t know about your schools, but the budget at my public high school was not very big. In four years, I went on one field trip, and it was during the last week of my senior year. Thus, when I went to the General Interest Meeting for Baseball Analytics at Tufts (BAT) during the fall of my freshman year, I was shocked to hear that the club had allocated in its budget a trip to Phoenix, Arizona, for the annual Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) Analytics Conference. 

Typically, the club sends a team of five to participate in the conference’s Diamond Dollars Case Competition. The competition features a prompt, usually announced a week in advance of the conference, which needs to be answered through research and analytics. Schools from around the country, including Syracuse, Rice, and Vanderbilt, compete. Tufts emerged triumphant in 2022.

During my freshman year, I did not make the final cut to join the team. However, this year, the club secured enough funds to send two teams of five. Thus, I eagerly applied in the fall and was delighted to find out that I had made the competition over Winter Break.

The prompt this year, regarding relief pitcher performance, was released on March 5, with the presentation needing to be submitted by March 12. Each night that week, my team met for an hour to create our presentation, often occupying the Tsungming Tu Complex long after classes concluded. After a week of hard work, we sent our presentation in and eagerly awaited the trip.  

On Thursday afternoon, March 13, our team departed from Logan International Airport bound for Phoenix. Our flight took off at 5 pm, and we landed in Phoenix around 8. After catching an Uber to our hotel, we rested up for our presentation, which would be at 9:30 the next morning.

The next day, we rolled out of bed and made the short walk to Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law. In our cohort, our team was the second to present. We presented around 9:30 to judges from the Miami Marlins, St. Louis Cardinals, and Houston Astros. Following our presentation, we went to support the other Tufts team while they delivered their lecture.

After all the presentations concluded, we grabbed lunch and eagerly awaited the results in the central atrium. Unfortunately, neither my team nor the other Tufts group won our cohort or the overall contest. On the bright side, though, the loss gave us more time to explore Phoenix, since we did not have to present again. 

The rest of the afternoon was spent listening to industry experts and fellow students present their own research to the conference, including discussions on the optimal path to a fly ball and the prevalence of elbow injuries in baseball. At around 5:00 pm, the day’s programming ended, and all of the attendees flocked to a networking event next door. Over empanadas and egg rolls, we had the opportunity to speak with MLB front office executives and leading members of the media. Our busy day concluded with a trip to the PHX Center to watch the NBA’s Phoenix Suns take on the Sacramento Kings. 

The next morning, I woke up early to attend a coffee chat session with some members of MLB’s league office. It was an incredible opportunity to learn about the rule changes MLB has been implementing over the past few years and to see how analytics is shaping modern baseball. The conference’s programming resumed shortly after, and the panels and lectures took up most of the day. Around lunchtime, the Tufts squad went over to a local park to eat our sandwiches and have a catch. The 70-degree weather and sunshine was certainly a nice change of pace from Medford. Following the conclusion of that day’s lectures, we attended a Chicago Cubs spring training game at Sloan Park in Mesa. Early the next morning, I hopped on a flight home to New Jersey.

I am extremely grateful that BAT was able to travel to Phoenix this year. While we did not win the Case Competition, I had the opportunity to network with those at the apex of baseball front offices and the sports analytics world. Moreover, I encountered like-minded students from other universities who shared my passion for baseball. We also had the opportunity to explore the greater Phoenix area and bask in the 70-degree sunshine. Most of all, though, the trip marked an opportunity to hang out with some incredible people outside of a stressful, academic environment. The memories I forged during the trip will last forever, and I cannot wait for next year’s conference. 

Photo Credit: Ben Goldberg