Sorry, but putting forward Sashi Brown as the apex of analytics is ridiculous. That’s like the Shank critique of guys in their basement or something. That BB doesn’t always agree with Sashi Brown literally does nothing to disprove all the examples I put forward (which you have not really resounded too). Cmon.
Sashi is relevant because he's basically the only example of an organization being run by analytics people rather than run by football people with analytics as a supporting piece. Maybe you could argue the Eagles, obviously a far great success story, but I don't think the Patriots and Eagles are run very similarly either.
What exactly do you think Ernie Adams’ role is if not effectively an analytics guy? Have you watched or read anything about what he does?
I have. I actually think Ernie Adams is a great example for this whole discussion, because I don't think he's effectively an analytics guy. The logic seems to be that because he looks like a nerd, and he's mysterious, and his title (Director of Football Research) suggests stats maybe, and he made money on Wall Street, and the Patriots are smart, so he must be the analytics guy.
But I don't think ultimately that there is much evidence this is true. To the extent there is information on the famously-secretive Adams, it revolves predominantly around film. He watches a ton of film and he has an eidetic memory, he breaks things down by situation to understand tendencies. He talked in Do Your Job about how he runs the scout team - a role that not only involves film analysis but also coaching the scout team to execute the plays in the way the other team does. Ernie has worked in traditional roles on both the coaching staff (as an offensive assistant) and personnel (he was director of player personnel). I think more than anything, he's a football guy from a non-traditional football background.
I'm sure that Adams is up on stats and analytics, because it is said that he reads every book that comes out about football and I believe it. That doesn't appear to be a major part of his job or value to the Patriots. He has a breadth of knowledge that likely includes analytics but also the rulebook (one consistent element to reports on Adams is that he helps Belichick on gameday with challenges), film, the playbook, football history, etc.
What do you make of their two point conversion chart if not analytics?
Probably every team in the league has a two-point conversion chart. Dick Vermeil developed one as a college coach in the '70's. The Patriots are not especially innovative when it comes to when to go for two in a way that suggests that are influenced by analytics trends. I don't think they do anything dumb either, but I can't think of an instance where Belichick did what
John Harbaugh did the other day, for instance.
How do you think the Halberstam book isn’t supportive of analytics? I read it and conclude the opposite.
My takeaway from
The Education of a Coach is that Belichick is the product of his parents: Steve the scout, and Jeannette the teacher. The empire is built on studying film and tendencies and on coaching the players (and coaches) to adapt to what they need to do to win the next week's game based on the film and tendency work. The empire is based on film and teaching. The first thing they do with entry-level hires is have them do "
pads," that is, painstakingly diagram plays from all-22 film. You could describe this approach as "analytical," but it is not really "analytics" in the sense that it is conventionally used. It is old-school football scouting taken to the nth degree.
I think
@Mystic Merlin 's "experience-based, intuitive sense" description is a good one. I think Belichick stumbles on decision-making that aligns with analytics, sometimes in retrospect. Like, Massey-Thaler published "The Loser's Curse" in 2005, showing that trading back was almost always preferable to trading up. But Belichick has been trading back well before that. Probably analytics has been more influenced by Belichick than Belichick has been influenced by analytics.