SABR Diamond Dollars Winners - Falk College

For the sixth straight year, members of the Department of Sport Management’s Sabermetrics Club participated in the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) Analytics’ Spring Diamond Dollars Case Competition. Due to Covid-19, the SU students did not travel last month to Phoenix, Arizona, but instead presented virtually from SU’s campus on March 13, 2020.

The competition is for undergraduate and graduate students from universities across the country to compete against each other by researching and presenting on a baseball analytics topic.

Four SU teams competed in the research-based case competition, with two SU teams winning their respective divisions. Students on SU’s winning teams were: Steven DiMaria, Hughston Preston, Ben Ayers, Joey Deaton and Cameron Mitchell; as well as Joe Pickering, Sean Kenney, Brendan McKeown, Cooper Shawver and Drake Mills.

Their assignment was to analyze the factors that contribute to a starting pitcher’s effectiveness when navigating a lineup for the third time in a game. Teams made their presentations by using programs such as R, Excel, and Tableau. They virtually presented their analysis and recommendations to a panel of judges in Phoenix that included Major League Baseball executives T.J. Barra (MLB), Paul Bien (San Francisco Giants), Cody Callahan (Arizona Diamondbacks), Tani Cohen (MLB), Evan Eshleman (Colorado Rockies), Ben Jedlovec (MLB), Katie Krall (Cincinnati Reds), Travis Petersen (MLB), Joe Rosales (Baseball Info Solutions), Kevin Tenenbaum (Cleveland Indians), Max Weinstein (Los Angeles Dodgers), and Keith Woolner (Cleveland Indians).

With the help of gifts from Falk College donors Jeff and Andrea Lomasky and Andrew Berlin, 20 Syracuse University sport analytics students were able to compete in this prestigious event.