Special Issue on Sports Analytics

Data and analytics have been part of the sports industry from as early as the 1870s, when the first boxscore in baseball was recorded. However, it is only recently that advanced data mining and machine learning techniques facilitated by our ability to collect more fine-grained data, have been utilized for facilitating the operations of sports franchises. Draft selection, game-day decision making, and player evaluation are just a few of the applications where sports analytics play a crucial role today. Apart from the sports clubs, other stakeholders in the industry (e.g., the leagues' offices, media, etc.) invest in analytics. The leagues increasingly rely on data to decide on potential rule changes.

This special issue on Big Data in sports analytics has a two-fold goal:

• Highlight exciting and impactful work in machine learning, artificial intelligence and data mining that provides a broad understanding of the way that the sports industry is utilizing big data
• Identify challenges (technical, ethical, practical etc.) in information systems and technology, as well as, in analytical frameworks as they pertain to applications of analytics in the sports industry

Topics of interest for this special issue include but are not limited to:
• Computer vision methods for player tracking
• Statistical learning methods for player evaluation
• Data-driven decision support systems for sports
• Causal inference for rule changes
• Big data for strength and conditioning, injury analytics/prevention
• Betting markets
• Behavioral analysis using sports as a lab
• Augmented and virtual reality in sports
• Sports business analytics (e.g., fan engagement, sports marketing etc.)

We would like to encourage organizations that may not typically write research papers to submit to this special issue. These papers do not have to describe proprietary technology but can be:
• Position papers describing current practical challenges in the industry
• Vision papers describing the future paths that sports analytics are likely to take 

We also encourage submission of papers that have been published in conference proceedings, with the requirement that the authors have made significant extensions as compared to the already published version of the study.

Expected first decision notification by: July 15, 2018