The Cleveland Browns are doubling down on technology to track and scout talent, by hiring Shaun Huls as Director of High Performance.
In a move that many people didn’t see coming because most fans probably didn’t know such a position existed, the Cleveland Browns have hired Shaun Huls as Director of High Performance. The move reunites Huls with Browns General Manager Andrew Berry, both of whom spent time with the Philadelphia Eagles.
The role that Huls will have with the Browns includes bringing in high-tech methods of player-tracking and analysis to the team, according to Cleveland.com. Does this mean that the team will abandon traditional talent evaluations? No, this is again just another element to the Cleveland Browns talent evaluation process. What does it mean for the future of the team and how much insight will the High Performance arm of the team actually have is anyone’s guess.
Cleveland.com goes on to say that the team will “… be placing a heavy emphasis this season on in-depth performance analytics, tracking players during practices and games to help determine peak performance and body composition.” So it looks like Huls isn’t just coming in for draft evaluation but to also monitor the team at a fundamental level during two-a-days, pre-season and everyday practice.
There should be some concerned by this because numbers out of context often don’t tell a complete story. Will there be too much emphasis placed on these stats? Will the coaches and the good old fashioned eye test be passed by in favor of numbers? Will there be so many calculations and number inputs that it begins to be white noise to those making decisions? The enormity of this undertaking is huge, and the amount of information that will be tracked, and recorded is even bigger.
While it’s not time to be all ‘doom-and-gloom’ it might be time to start wondering what exactly the team is hoping to achieve with all of this analytics-based approach that they couldn’t do in a more conventional way.