Bobcats GM Rich Cho engineers ‘one-stop shopping’ scouting database

HMMMHMM · Jun 25, 2012

Nothing too fancy, but still pretty interesting. I wouldn't be surprised if the Rockets had something similar at their disposal.

The Charlotte Bobcats’ new database scouting system has over 50,000 web pages.

You can instantly look up year-by-year statistics for Boston Celtics great Bill Russell … or any other player in NBA history. You can check the injury archive of a Slovenian playing in the Spanish league or whether a forward in the Development League was ever busted for drugs.

This is Charlotte Bobcats general manager Rich Cho’s baby, an Internet-friendly system that took six months and a six-figure cost to develop. Now it evolves daily and gets put to the test in Thursday night’s NBA draft, when the Bobcats select second and 31st following a 7-59 season.

Cho’s boss, president of basketball operations Rod Higgins, has a simple description for this complex tool: “One-stop shopping.”

The result, the Bobcats hope, is that quicker access to a buffet of information offers a competitive advantage in player evaluation.

When Cho interviewed with the Bobcats a year ago, he told Higgins and team owner Michael Jordan he thought the front office needed more staffing and fresh technology. When you’re dealing with decisions as consequential as the No. 2 pick, don’t you want the best tools available?

Jordan agreed, approving the hiring of three new support staff, including a Harvard graduate to oversee statistical analysis. Then Jordan tasked Cho with reviewing the Bobcats’ scouting system, to see whether it should be replaced.

The Bobcats were using “Hawkeye,” one of several plug-in scouting tools NBA teams can buy and adapt to their needs. Cho thought it wiser to start from scratch, to customize a Bobcats-only system. Among NBA executives, he has a rare background that qualifies him to do just that.

Cho’s undergraduate degree was in engineering and he worked in that field for Boeing before attending law school at Pepperdine. When he interned for his then-hometown Seattle Supersonics during a summer break from law school, general manager Wally Walker tasked him with refining the team’s scouting system.

“I want to be the most technologically advanced general manager in the league,” Cho recalls Walker saying.

Cho enlisted an acquaintance from Microsoft to build the Sonics’ system and linked up with him again for the Bobcats’ version (Cho won’t identify his Microsoft contact for competitive reasons. Why let other NBA teams mimic his designs?)

The approach

Cho’s system has all the basics you’d expect: Player contracts, statistics that can be used to compare Bobcats players’ development to others’, any potential bonuses that could complicate trade discussions. But beyond that, this is a function of Cho’s self-description as “a big information hound.”

Call it nosey if you like. To Cho, it’s being forewarned. You can see both the engineer and the lawyer in Cho’s concept.

He tells the scouting staff to be perceptive with their “eyes” (in writing scouting reports), their “ears” (dig deep in background checks: Is a player a leader or a follower? Does he smoke or drink? Does he care about others?) and through “numbers” (a wealth of statistics that can be collated a variety of ways for apples-to-apples comparison).

Beyond that, Cho asks the team’s scouting staff for two things: Look ahead, not behind, and develop a consistency in evaluating players’ development.

There’s a quote from hockey great Wayne Gretzky that Cho likes, repeated throughout these web pages like a mantra: “When everyone else is looking where the puck is, I’m looking at where the puck will be.”

The reports

In an attempt to see trends ahead of the pack, Cho remade how Bobcats scouts file their reports. He didn’t like the standard practice of rating a player’s shooting or dribbling 1 through 10, because one scout’s eight was another scout’s six.

So he came up with a nine-level system with labels, descriptions and examples, for scouts to use as a guide. The rankings: Franchise, Core, Top starter, Starter, Key reserve, Reserve, Roster, Minor-league, No-Bobcat.

There are fewer than 10 current NBA players graded as “franchise.” As Cho described, “we’re talking about players who can change the caliber of a team.”

At the other end, Cho describes a “No-Bobcat” as a player whose talent falls far short of NBA-caliber or who’s behavior is so egregious it can’t be tolerated.

Beyond that, Cho installed a scouting template for every report. That includes an Internet function that automatically pops pertinent numbers (such as Kentucky star Anthony Davis’ shots blocked) into reports quickly after games end. Cho said he wants scouts writing evaluations, not keyboarding numbers.

The result

What the Bobcats got for this investment is a system that drills deeper into player backgrounds, offers consistent evaluations and is dramatically speedier in updating information. Now, when a staffer scouts a game, one keystroke emails the info to every decision-maker on the team.

Speed matters. You might have 20 minutes before the trade deadline at mid-season when you’re offered a deal. You want the comparative salaries, the statistics and intel on involved players all in one place instantly. That’s even truer on draft night, when there are five minutes between each first-round pick and two minutes between second-round picks.

Higgins loves Cho’s innovations. He says his office now fits inside his smart phone.

“This really simplifies the whole process, whether we’re talking about player comparisons or dollar-for-dollar for trades,” Higgins said. “There are tons of questions (you might need answered quickly).

There’s not a number we can’t now get on a dime.”
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http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/06/23/3337874/bobcats-hope-massive-revamp-of.html

Juxtaposed Jolt · Jun 25, 2012

I feel like his talent is wasted on such a bad team.

Aleron · Jun 25, 2012

it sort of seems since Cho was hired that Jordan is more hands off and doesn't seem to want to micromanage everything.

BigMaloe · Jun 25, 2012

morey-2

BigMaloe · Jun 25, 2012

good read and good find hmmhmm...

Yung-T · Jun 25, 2012

Am looking forward to seeing what the future holds for that franchise, Cho is a top 5 GM in my eyes they are making all the right steps to be successful in the next years.

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Bobcats GM Rich Cho engineers ‘one-stop shopping’ scouting database

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