How Technology Boosts the Boston Red Sox’s Game

As technology continues to evolve and grow, sports teams are taking advantage of this to boost their team’s stats – especially the Boston Red Sox.

Steve Conley, director of IT for the Boston Red Sox, and his IT team provide sports technology tools that allow the baseball players to perform at their highest level, both on and off the field.

According to Conley, the Boston Red Sox IT department’s greatest thing they put together was the video system, which has expanded and evolved over time since it’s creation 10 years ago. The team carries the system with them on the road where they capture every at-bat situation, and after at-bat situation. The players can then review it on a computer directly after and will be able to learn from their mistakes. Not only can they watch themselves at-bat and after batting, but they also have every batter-pitcher breakdown statistic in the Major Leagues since 2004 to look at, so they can look up any pitcher on any count to see if they can get an edge on the competition. Many of the players use that tool extensively, Conley said.

So, what separates the technology of sports from other industry-specific IT jobs? There are certain job tasks that specialize when it comes to sports where you have to handle the needs that are stadium-specific. Although, there is a great amount of overlap when it comes to technology of sports and general IT needs. Conley said about 15% of what the Boston Red Sox IT department does is specific to sports, baseball in particular, and the remaining 85% are the IT needs that you would find regardless of industry.

Technology is changing the way the Boston Red Sox and many other teams play sports and is bettering their game. The video system created by Steve Conley and his IT team is one technology tool that has helped the Red Sox up its game and become an ever better baseball team.