Applied Sports Science newsletter – March 25, 2021

… Given all that has transpired in the past 18 months, the impulse to keep Dike’s feet firmly planted on the ground is understandable. In the fall of 2019, Dike was suiting up in the NCAA Men’s College Cup final for the University of Virginia. That season set the stage for getting drafted by MLS side Orlando City SC, where he scored eight goals and had four assists in 19 league and playoff appearances, and was a finalist for Young Player of the Year. That translated into a loan deal with English Championship side Barnsley, and after scoring five goals in 11 league appearances, Dike is now being linked with clubs in the Premier League’s “Big Six” of Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool.

“The transition has been crazy,” said Dike. “I think it’s something that throughout my entire life I’ve kind of looked forward to. I’ve kind of dreamed of having this transition and being able to play with top-quality players and top-quality staff. It’s been phenomenal.”

Most impressive of all is that Dike has managed to adapt to a soccer culture and tactical approach far different than what he experienced in Orlando. The cold and rain of England is sharp shock from the heat and humidity of central Florida. And he’s no longer the biggest, strongest man on the field.

This study aimed to verify the effects of congested fixture and matches’ participation on internal and external workload indexes in professional Brazilian soccer players. Rate of perceived exertion-based training load (sRPE), distance- and accelerometry-based measures were daily monitored over 119 training sessions and 33 matches performed by 29 male outfield players. Weeks were classified as congested (n=11, two or more matches within a 7-day period) and regular (n=10, one match or less within a 7-day period). The players were divided based on the matches’ participation: (i) players who played ≥ 60 minutes (G1); (ii) players who played < 60 minutes (G2); (iii) players who did not participated of the match (G3). The findings showed that independent of the levels of participation during the matches, regular weeks presented greater acute, monotony, and strain indices for internal and external workload measures than congested weeks. The G1 presented the highest values for the most of the workload indices in both regular and congested weeks, with the exception of monotony indices (internal and external load) that G2 showed greater values than G1 and G3. Coaches and practitioners should plan the training “doses” to reduce disparities of these different match’s participation and congested schedule weeks.

… In my toolbox article last month, I introduced the concept of using your Heart Rate Variability (HRV) – the difference in timing between subsequent heartbeats – to provide insight into how you are personally responding to your training program. In this month’s article, I am going to follow up on those same researchers who wanted to compare this novel HRV-Guided (HRV-G) approach to a block periodized approach.

Coaches’ planning in elite performance sports involves description, forecasting, organisation, design, and assessment of all training stimuli. It is about achieving the best possible fitness state in order to help the athlete succeed in the competition. However, while in individual sports this bioenergetic or technical-tactical state should be as high as possible, this is not the case in team sports. There are many more elements to take into account.

After several years of experience – and many successes – with the digital monitoring of the grass in the Johan Cruijff Arena, it is not surprising that more organizations are reaching out to the services of HI-Sports. Besides the KNVB, where HI sports has developed a grass dashboard for all premier league clubs and the Johan Cruijff Arena as a living-lab where HI-sports works on various innovations, many others regularly knock on the company’s door. One of these is Stogger, a Panningen-based engineering company with a specialization in LED lighting. The question was: can you give us specific lighting advice for optimal treatment of the turf in De Koel?

HI-Sports (an initiative of Eindhoven-based Holland Innovative) with data biologist Joep van Cranenbroek knows what to do with that kind of question. “We have known Stogger for some time now, but a while back they approached us with a specific question about the lighting of sports fields. Their technical expertise combined with our knowledge of data-driven sports field maintenance and management obviously gave enormous possibilities.”

In an attempt to lessen the use by pitchers of foreign substances on balls, MLB is notifying clubs that it will begin using its Statcast data to analyze increases in spin rate, specifically for pitchers suspected of doctoring baseballs, The Post has learned.

Manipulating the baseball by changing its structure with a nick or cut or by using substances that change the trajectory of pitches is as old as the game. Nevertheless, in recent years the analytic wave has increased awareness of the benefit of spin to make fastballs ride better and breaking pitches break more.

A trial of mouthguard technology will influence what limits are placed on heading training in professional football, the Football Association’s head of medicine has said.

Dr Charlotte Cowie told a parliamentary inquiry looking at concussion in sport that an independent expert panel advising the FA had now recommended a reduction on the amount of heading practice in training at senior level, to go alongside existing guidelines already in place in youth football.

“There is no argument about decreasing the exposure to the amount of heading in the game,” she said.

… Scientists don’t know for sure if rumination causes depression. But “if it doesn’t cause depression, it certainly perpetuates it,” says Ian Gotlib. He is a psychologist at Stanford University in California. Gotlib is one of many scientists trying to understand teen depression.

People are diagnosed with depression when they experience at least five of nine main symptoms. These include depressed mood and loss of interest or enjoyment in activities. Altered sleep patterns and appetite. Overall low energy. Anxiety and trouble concentrating. Feelings of guilt or low self-worth and thoughts about death. Some are more common than others, but few people experience all of them.

The various mixes of these symptoms number in the hundreds, Gotlib says. And that can make depression tricky to treat.

The Wolf Pack athletic department has created a program aimed at improving funding for its female athletes.

The “Alpha Fund” campaign was the brainchild of UNR president Brian Sandoval. Nevada said it has raised nearly $30,000 through 10 donations before Wednesday’s official announcement of the program.

“The Alpha Fund is an effort to provide nutrition education and quality food in order to help our women’s Wolf Pack student-athletes reach their peak performance – in training, competition, and in the classroom,” Sandoval said in a news release. “The creation of this program provides maximum flexibility for all of our women’s programs that practice and compete throughout the academic year. The goal is to provide a full meal featuring foods and calories that will help our women’s Wolf Pack student-athletes move one step closer to realizing their competitive dreams at the university.”

… Given the proposed therapeutic benefits associated with CBD, especially in relation to pain management, and the relatively recent legislative changes in sport, it is important that athletes and practitioners have an appreciation for the current claims, evidence, prevalence and safety concerns surrounding this herbal intervention. Therefore, the aims of this Sports Science Exchange article are to: 1) provide an overview of the endocannabinoid system (ECS); 2) provide an appraisal of the current evidence and efficacy in relation to CBD use in sport; and 3) highlight the issues and risks surrounding inadvertent doping following the use of CBD.

Here’s something so wild that when I first saw it (h/t u/ghrghr_) I thought I read it wrong: the list of the top 250 seasons by True Shooting Percentage includes 36 players from this season.

Let me say that again.

36 of the 250 most efficient scoring seasons of all-time are happening right now.

… “The NCAA and its members are evolving as the sports wagering continues to change. We are continuing to expand our efforts across these important areas to ensure we are protecting the integrity of competition and the well-being of student-athletes,” an NCAA spokesperson told ESPN in a statement. “Sports wagering education remains a priority of the NCAA’s efforts with the goal of providing a variety of materials to support the membership’s educational initiatives.”

The AFL needs to abandon all pretense of players being substituted for medical reasons and call the new 23rd man rule what it is and will be – an emergency sub.

It is clear after just one round that clubs substituted injured players out of games and replaced them with fresh players because those injured players were unable to finish the game they were in, not because there was doubt about whether they could start the next one.
Nick Vlastuin was subbed off against Carlton but looks set to recover for this weekend.

It is also clear that the idea a doctor can, with a high degree of accuracy, diagnose the recovery time of an injury on the sidelines during a game and without access to scans, X-rays, blood tests or hyperbaric chambers – and be held to that prediction – is an utter nonsense.

The NHL is instituting changes to the draft lottery that make it more difficult for the last-place team to drop out of the top three in the selection order.

Beginning with the 2021 draft, only the first two picks will be subject to the lottery instead of the top three, and no team can move up more than 10 picks. Starting in 2022, no team will be able to win the draft lottery — for either of the first two spots — more than twice in a five-year span.

… In this post of Scouting Sessions, we sit down with Vahe Tanielian who is Director of Data Analytics at Major League Soccer’s Real Salt Lake City. He discusses the implementation of data across the club, specific challenges faced in the MLS and much more.