Applied Sports Science newsletter – October 20, 2015

A star in the ascendancy meets a star on the wane this weekend at Goodison Park as Wayne Rooney’s Manchester United visit Ross Barkley’s Everton, Rooney’s former side. On balance, you would understand if Rooney decided that his injured ankle needed a little more rest. In this part of Merseyside, Everton fans used to love him as much as they now love Barkley. These days, Rooney tends to be welcomed at Everton much as you welcome a cat dragging half a rat through the cat flap — with a combination of rage and disgust.

… So what’s Stotts’ secret? In a league that trends toward clear-outs and individual play, how does he get a team to play so seamlessly, so together?

It starts in training camp.

He keeps the first weeks of practices simple. The agenda is heavy on skills and light on X’s and O’s. The plays he does implement are not designed for a player or a certain shot. Instead, they are reliant upon passing and making reads to discover the best shot.

At the last meeting of all 20 managers in the Barclays Premier League, Arsene Wenger and Louis van Gaal were openly critical of the standards of coaching in academy football.

It has taken Wenger a while to get to this point, but the failure of Arsenal’s fabled Hale End academy to bring through a recent first-team regular has prompted action.

Jack Wilshere (signed from Luton), Kieran Gibbs (Wimbledon) and Francis Coquelin (Stade Lavallois) are the last group of players from the academy to go on to play regularly for the senior side. [commercial video autoplays in right column]

After a disappointing and injury-riddled season in which the Washington Nationals failed to reach the playoffs, changes won’t be limited simply to the manager’s office, coaching staff and roster. The Nationals also dismissed head athletic trainer Lee Kuntz, assistant trainer Steve Gober and strength and conditioning coach John Philbin on Friday, according to multiple people familiar with the situation.

The Astros will not be bringing back head trainer Nate Lucero next season, people familiar with the decision told the Chronicle on Friday night.

Machines have been able to talk to each other and to computers for a long time, so what’s the big deal with the IoT? That’s the first question I ask Joe Biron, my guest on this episode of the Solid Podcast. Biron is VP of IoT technology at ThingWorx, a PTC business that offers a platform for rapid development of Internet of Things applications.

The answer, says Joe, is that where the machine-to-machine (M2M) model is stovepiped and specialized, the IoT entails a platform approach. Machines on the IoT are abstracted, which makes decentralized application development possible. And it’s more flexible: the platform will eventually be able to accommodate new applications that haven’t been conceived yet. [audio, 42:08]

Nike announced a new partnership with animation company DreamWorks, new steps in 3D printing and the imminent launch of mobile personalisation.

Nike will be using DreamWorks’ new design platform, Nova, to enable “ultrarapid prototyping” and better 3D imaging.

The company also predicted that personalisation would become a mainstream consumer demand in future.

On Tuesday, September 29th, 2015 Columbia Entrepreneurship, Columbia Athletics, and Columbia Organization for Rising Entrepreneurs Presented Sports, the Digital Bellwether Founders, Technologists, and Digital Media Innovators from Adidas, MLBAM, NFL, NBA, NHL, Under Armour, The Players’ Tribune and More in conversation with NBA Commissioner Emeritus David J. Stern, Columbia Law School ’66
The second panel was called “Sports Tech and the Quantified Athlete”. This panel examined how human-to-computer interfaces and wearable electronics are revolutionizing the way coaches recruit, how athletes train, how the media creates content, and how fans use player tracking to get more deeply engaged in the game. [video, 36:10]

… The Dodgers Accelerator is hosting 10 startups over a three-month period that will end with a demo day for investors in November. We talked to Dodgers CFO Tucker Kain to learn more about how the accelerator can help entrepreneurs hit their ideas out of the park.

Background: Variations in formulations used to prepare platelet-rich plasmas (PRPs) result in differences in the cellular composition and biomolecular characteristics.

Purpose: To evaluate the cellular composition and the cytokine-release kinetics of PRP according to differences in the preparation protocols. …
Results: The DS PRP had a higher concentration of platelets and leukocytes than did the SS PRP. Every PRP preparation exhibited an increase in PDGF, TGF, VEGF, and FGF release when compared with whole blood samples. The FGF and TGF release occurred quickly and decreased over time, while the PDGF and VEGF release was constant and sustained over 7 days. The PDGF and VEGF concentrations were higher in the DS PRP than in the SS PRP, whereas the TGF and FGF concentrations were higher in the SS PRP than in the DS PRP. Biomet GPS had the highest VEGF and MMP-9 concentrations but the lowest TGF concentration. Arthrex ACP had the highest FGF concentration but the lowest PDGF concentration. Prodizen Prosys had the highest IL-1 concentration and higher PDGF concentration than Arthrex ACP.

Conclusion: The DS method generally led to a higher concentration of platelet relative to the SS method. However, the cytokine content was not necessarily proportional to the cellular composition of the PRPs, as the greater content could be different between the SS or DS method depending on the type of cytokine.

Clinical Relevance: Physicians should select proper PRP preparations after considering their biomolecular characteristics and patient indications.

Brandon Noble is 10 years removed from his seven-year NFL career and now works near Philadelphia as a financial adviser. But the former Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins defensive tackle wasn’t surprised when a reporter tracked him down Wednesday to discuss New York Giants tight end Daniel Fells, who has become the latest athlete to be diagnosed with MRSA, a frightening, antibiotic-resistant staph infection that can result in multiple surgeries, amputations and, rarely, even death.

“I’ve been waiting for my phone to ring,” said Noble, who was forced to retire from the Redskins in 2006 at age 31 after surviving two harrowing bouts with MRSA, the first after what was supposed to be a “minor” knee cleanup procedure.

“Until I had it, I’d never heard of it, I didn’t have a clue,” Noble said. “MRSA was relatively new to the general public.

For Irish or Welsh rugby fans recent weeks have seen a fair degree of anxiety over injuries. But what does it feel like for players? And what can a coach do?

Recently we found some new research from America about musculoskeletal injury (strains and sprains) and coaching. This was not how to treat or prevent injuries but how to deal with the anxiety suffered by players on the side lines.

A meeting of 37 concussion clinicians and researchers this week in Pittsburgh — described as “unprecedented” by UPMC, but viewed with skepticism by others — produced a consensus that prolonged rest, a popular treatment option for concussions, does not aid recovery and can actually worsen it.

“Experts here in Pittsburgh recognized how critical a need it was for us to bring experts together and finally make this statement,” Dr. David Okonkwo of UPMC said. “This is paradigm shifting. People may underestimate the impact of this, but on a global basis, every single person who sustains a concussion is told prolonged rest.

… Then again, amid all the exhortations to be “too legit to quit,” what if another song actually serves as a better guide to life—one whose message is less demanding, perhaps, and understands what it’s like to have eff reserves hovering dangerously near zero. What if it’s more important to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em, and know when to walk away?

For a recent study published in the Journal of Research in Personality, researchers from the University of Southern California and Northeastern University put hundreds of participants through a series of three studies on grit. In each, the researchers quizzed subjects about how “gritty” they are, based on how much they agree with statements like, “Setbacks don’t discourage me” and “I finish whatever I begin.”

… Recently, someone asked what keeps me up at night. It’s the fear that the mindset concepts, which grew up to counter the failed self-esteem movement, will be used to perpetuate that movement. In other words, if you want to make students feel good, even if they’re not learning, just praise their effort! Want to hide learning gaps from them? Just tell them, “Everyone is smart!” The growth mindset was intended to help close achievement gaps, not hide them. It is about telling the truth about a student’s current achievement and then, together, doing something about it, helping him or her become smarter.

I also fear that the mindset work is sometimes used to justify why some students aren’t learning: “Oh, he has a fixed mindset.” We used to blame the child’s environment or ability.