Analytics helping drive on-field success for baseball Bears

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Things look different in Mason Hull’s senior season at Missouri State than they did when he first became a Bear.

“It’s definitely changed a lot in my five years here,” Hull said.

Some of those changes have helped the Bears baseball standout, who hit 15 home runs a year ago.

“My first few years here we didn’t have a lot of the stuff we have now,” Hull said.

What kind of stuff?

“We’ve got all the toys here,” said Associate Head Coach Joey Hawkins.

By toys, Hawkins means all of the technology the Bears use to improve their play on the field.

“Stadium Trackman, portable Trackman, the iPitch pitching machine, Blast Motion swing analyzer, Uplift biomechanics which is for both hitting and pitching,” Hawkins says of the systems the Bears have.

Missouri State was the first college program to work with Uplift Labs — giving the Bears a detailed look at what happens on every swing and every pitch.

“Just gives us something that our eyes can’t see on how fast a ball is thrown or hit,” Hawkins said. “It’s anything on how fast their limbs are moving, how they load or unload, or how explosive they are.”

“It’s really important for me to see consistency overall,” said Missouri State junior Brandt Thomspon. “If my pitches start moving differently, it’s easy to look at that and be able to correct it.”

Meanwhile, the Trackman system looks at where the ball goes after it’s hit by a batter.

The big thing for our hitters here is just getting visual feedback of every ball that they have,” Hawkins says. “It starts with just a basic spray chart, and how hard it is with the exit velocity, to how high it was and the direction and distance on the field. As we collect data for our players it’s important for us to get a lot of data points so you can have averages.”

They also have the Blast Motion system.

“Blast motion which monitors all of our hitters’ swings,” Hawkins said. “Their swing path, their bat speed, and stuff like that.”

They also have a special pitching machine, donated by former Bear Jake Gerber.

“Basically it can throw any pitch at any time to our hitters and it can match the opposing pitcher that we’re about to face as well,” Hawkins.

Clearly, it works.

“If you look at our numbers for the past two years you can really see a drastic change,” Hull said.

The Bears have hit more than 140 home runs since the start of last season with a batting average over .280.

Hawkins says having these tools is crucial for the program.

“This is a player-driven program so if you’re not doing everything you can to make those players better you’re not really holding your word,” Hawkins said.

With all the technology and information it may seem easy to overcomplicate things but Hawkins says the coaching staff studies the s information and relays the important pieces to the players.

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