Here's a data viz 🧵 of 5 athletes who had the biggest growth on Instagram in 2023 📱📈

🔗:

(1) Shohei Ohtani, who gained more followers during the World Baseball Classic than during his MLB MVP season or when he signed with the @Dodgers last month wp.me/pc2RuA-1lyVXa
(2) The ~500K followers that Kelce gained around the time the @Chiefs won Super Bowl LVII ended up being a blip on his 2023 graph once he started dating Taylor Swift

He's now up to 5.4 million followers—Taylor has 279 million (!!!)

NBA-wide offensive rating is 115.6 this season, on pace to break the all-time record yet again

🔗:

The way officials call the game has never been more advantageous towards offensive players

A 🧵... (1/6) wp.me/pc2RuA-1lyVCu
The amount of contact that offensive players are allowed to initiate now relative to prior eras is astounding

Here’s Jayson Tatum uppercutting his stationary defender and getting *rewarded* with a free throw (also that moving screen by Smart 🤦‍♂️)

(2/6)

There are 18 clubs from the world's 15th-ranked soccer league based on on-field quality (MLS) in @Sportico's top 50 most valuable soccer clubs in the world

Why is this the case? 🧵 (1/5) MLS revenues average only $57M per team, a fraction of what the big clubs bring in. But the lack of relegation, which is rare in a sport built on a system of moving up and down based on performance, helps set a valuations floor of ~$400M—higher than half the Premier League

Pretty wild that being the best team in the NHL over the course of an 82 game sample size means basically nothing for the playoffs (as the Bruins learned the hard way this year)

A 🧵... The nature of hockey lends itself to upsets. Oddsmakers know this

Despite being the greatest regular season team of all time, the Bruins only had -380 odds to beat the Panthers

In contrast, 5 of the 8 favorites in the NBA’s first round had better odds than the Bruins

Historical #NBAPlayoffs Trends 📈🧵

1) The pace slows down 2) Teams run more isolation offense in the playoffs

I think officiating hasn't been mentioned enough as a factor in the NBA's offensive explosion this season

16.6% of all 2-point shot attempts drew fouls this year, a massive increase from 15.2% last season, which was already the highest mark of the 21st century Before the 2021-22 season, the NBA announced a crackdown on “non-basketball moves'' by offensive players to draw fouls. The new guidelines were strictly enforced at first, but then frequency of shooting fouls started to go WAY up, and that trend carried into 2022-23

3-part hypothesis for why we're seeing so many insane stat lines in the NBA:

1) More heliocentrism ==> stars' usage rates are higher than ever

https://twitter.com/WorldWideWob/status/1610480239125331969

2) More smallball lineups and fewer rim protectors ==> easier finishing at the rim (and stars can get to the rim better than anyone else to take advantage)

Each day for the next two weeks, I'll add an #NFL fun fact or stat to this 🧵

🏈 Fun Fact #1: Teams favored by >7 points are 23-1 outright thru Week 8 (only loss is Cincy losing to Mike White & the @nyjets last week). Teams favored by <7 points are only 43-44 (a losing record!) 🏈 Fun Fact #2: Read this one carefully...

The 2021 Seahawks have allowed just the 22nd most points per game of any team in the NFL this season, even though they have allowed the 22nd most yards per game of any team in NFL HISTORY!!!