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Sig Mejdal

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Sig Mejdal
Sig Mejdal
Born (1965-12-31) December 31, 1965 (age 58)
San Jose, California, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma materUniversity of California, Davis; San Jose State University

Sig Mejdal (/ˈmaɪdəl/ MY-dəl; born December 31, 1965) is the assistant general manager for the Baltimore Orioles of Major League Baseball.

Early life and education

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Sig Mejdal grew up in San Jose, California. His mother was a nurse and his father was a career army officer. In his youth, Mejdal played little league baseball for six years during his youth.[1]: 43  He was a fan of the Oakland A's and a member of the Society for American Baseball Research.[2] Mejdal also developed an early interest in baseball statistics at that time.[3]

He graduated from University of California, Davis with bachelor's degrees in mechanical engineering and aeronautical engineering. Mejdal later earned master's degrees in operations research and cognitive psychology[4] from San Jose State University.[5] While attending college in the late 1980s, he worked as a blackjack dealer at High Sierra in Lake Tahoe.[4]

Career

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After graduating from UC Davis in 1989,[3] Mejdal worked for NASA and Lockheed Martin's satellite operations unit at the Onizuka Air Force Station.[1]: 113 [6] Mejdal's interest in baseball was recreational until 2003, when the book, Moneyball inspired him to consider pursuing a career in sabermetrics.[3][7] He attended the Winter Meetings in search for a job in baseball,[8] didn’t get a job and continued to work NASA as a biomathematician in the Fatigue Countermeasures Group.[1]: 23  Mejdal studied sleep patterns of astronauts on the International Space Station[9] in order to optimize their sleep schedules.[8][10]

While working for NASA, Mejdal took a side job as the chief quantitative analyst for Sam Walker's fantasy baseball team Streetwalkers Baseball Club,[10][11] which was participating in the Tout Wars competition's "Battle of the Experts."[10] The fantasy team would later become the subject of Walker's book: Fantasyland: A Sportswriter's Obsessive Bid to Win the World's Most Ruthless Fantasy Baseball.[9]

St. Louis Cardinals

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In 2005, Sig Mejdal was recruited to do sabermetrics for the St. Louis Cardinals' new analytics department.[12] He analyzed years of data from college baseball games using an algorithm designed to project the likely performance and statistics of baseball players.[13] This analytical approach was utilized by the Cardinals to effectively identify talent in the later rounds of the drafts.[13]

Over the next seven seasons, utilizing Mejdal's algorithm, the St. Louis Cardinals drafted more players who became major leaguers than any other organization.[14] He was promoted to senior quantitative analyst in 2008[15] and director of amateur draft analysis in January 2011.[16][17] The Cardinals won the World Series in 2006 and 2011, with help from Mejdal.[18]

Mejdal also created a formula to predict the risk of injury to baseball players[19] and contributed a section on injury probability to The Bill James Handbook.[20]

Houston Astros

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In 2012, Mejdal became the Director of Decision Sciences for the Houston Astros, where he supported recruitment decisions based on physical tests and historical player performance.[2][7][21] Hiring Mejdal to apply an analytics-based decision tree on their player choices part of the front office's effort to revitalize the team and address performance issues from prior seasons.[14] Employing his skills as a former NASA researcher, he helped create the STOUT system in St. Louis, named after the combination of "stat" and "scout," for making player choices.[22][23] In the time that Mejdal was with the Astros, they drafted more major leaguers than any other organization.[24] The system was criticized for de-humanizing players, but after trading off some players and making new recruits, the Astro's farm system became ranked among the best in baseball.[4] The Astros also used analytics to persuade players that were uncomfortable with non-traditional positions on the field to embrace shifts, which the team now uses very heavily.[4][25] Mejdal was instrumental in the development of the Houston Astros' farm system and the team's improvement from three consecutive seasons with at least 106 losses to winning the World Series in 2017.[18] Additionally, he played an important role in introducing more intensive batting practice routines before games.[26]

In 2015, Mejdal was one of the team's advisers whose login credentials were believed to have been used to hack into the team's database.[27]

Baltimore Orioles

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In 2018, the Baltimore Orioles began rebuilding their team by hiring Mike Elias, previously from the Houston Astros, as General Manager. Elias subsequently hired Mejdal as Vice President and Assistant General Manager of Analytics.[28] Mejdal helped Elias by implementing advanced analytics and international scouting, similar to their successful approach with the Houston Astros. Their strategy involved dismantling the existing roster to rebuild it from the ground up, focusing on young, cost-effective talent.[29] Key acquisitions, such as trading for ace pitcher Corbin Burnes, have positioned the Orioles as a competitive team in Major League Baseball.[29] The Orioles moved from 110 losses in 2021 to 100 wins in 2023 and progressed from being 61 games behind the first place in 2018 to winning the AL East in 2023.[30]

Bibliography

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  • Mejdal, Sig; Melissa M. Mallis; Tammy T. Nguyen; David F. Dinges (March 2004). "Summary of the Key Features of Seven Biomathematical Models of Human Fatigue and Performance". Aviation, Space, and Environmental Medicine. 75 (3): 4–14. PMID 15018262.

Further reading

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References

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  1. ^ a b c Sam Walker (27 February 2007). Fantasyland: A Sportswriter's Obsessive Bid to Win the World's Most Ruthless Fantasy Baseball League. Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-303843-6. Archived from the original on 26 July 2014. Retrieved 13 January 2013.
  2. ^ a b McTaggart, Brian (January 31, 2012). "Analyze this: Astros' Mejdal takes on unique role". MLB.com. Archived from the original on August 21, 2014. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  3. ^ a b c "A numbers game". UC Davis Magazine. pp. Volume 28, Number 2, Winter 2011. Archived from the original on December 7, 2012. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  4. ^ a b c d Reiter, Ben. "Astro-Matic Baseball". SportsIllustrated. Archived from the original on July 3, 2014. Retrieved June 27, 2014.
  5. ^ Dorsey, David (April 17, 2006). "Teams turn to numbers crunchers". The News Press. pp. CC.1. Archived from the original on February 16, 2013. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  6. ^ Matthews, Alan (October 2, 2006). "BA's Alan Matthews attends the Major League Scouting Bureau's "Scout School"". School's In. Baseball America. Archived from the original on January 28, 2012. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  7. ^ a b Cohen, Jason (January 5, 2012). "Astros GM Makes Up a Fancy Title for His "Moneyball" Stat Guy". Daily Post. Archived from the original on January 15, 2012. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  8. ^ a b Booher, Kary (April 23, 2008). "Cards turn analytical for draft decisions". News-Leader. Archived from the original on July 14, 2014. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  9. ^ a b Levine, Zachary (February 11, 2012). "Astros' Sig Mejdal to utilize diamond data in projection game". Houston Chronicle. Archived from the original on February 13, 2012. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  10. ^ a b c Walker, Sam. "Reality Check". Sports Illustrated. Archived from the original on August 13, 2007. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  11. ^ Walker, Sam (June 15, 2006). "A Different Kind of Draft Day". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on October 24, 2017. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  12. ^ Walton, Brian (January 13, 2012). "Interview: Cards Scout Head Kantrovitz: Pt. 1". Archived from the original on August 21, 2014. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  13. ^ a b Enterprises, Lee (July 3, 2015). "Analytics at heart of Cards' success, federal probe : Sports". stltoday.com. Archived from the original on February 3, 2017. Retrieved July 12, 2015.
  14. ^ a b Lindbergh, Ben (2019-06-03). "How the Astros Revolutionized Player Development". The Ringer. Retrieved July 19, 2024.
  15. ^ Everson, Darren (March 7, 2008). "Baseball Taps Wisdom of Fans". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on November 8, 2021. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  16. ^ "Cards Promote Two in Baseball Ops". CBS. January 7, 2011. Archived from the original on August 22, 2014. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  17. ^ Carroll, Will. "Cardinals Team Healthy Report 2011". Sports Illustrated. Archived from the original on February 15, 2013.
  18. ^ a b McLaughlin, Corey (2019-01-28). "Inside the Mind of Former NASA Engineer Co-Piloting the Orioles' Rebuild". Baltimore Magazine. Retrieved July 19, 2024.
  19. ^ Carroll, Will (March 4, 2008). "Team Health Reports". Baseball Prospectus. Archived from the original on September 14, 2011. Retrieved January 15, 2013.
  20. ^ Carroll, Will (April 11, 2006). "Under The Knife: Danger is Will's Middle Name". Baseball Prospectus. Archived from the original on September 11, 2011. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
  21. ^ Rogers, Phil (January 7, 2012), "Time for Big Z to step to plate", Chicago Tribune, archived from the original on June 30, 2012, retrieved December 14, 2012
  22. ^ Kepner, Tyler (2019-02-22). "After Hitting Rock Bottom, the Orioles Turn to Data, and a New G.M." The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved July 22, 2024.
  23. ^ Goold, Derrick (June 7, 2007). "Baseball Draft: Cardinals get STOUT". St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
  24. ^ "2022 Orioles Media Guide" (PDF). pressbox.athletics.com.
  25. ^ Waldstein, David (May 12, 2014). "Who's on Third? In Baseball's Shifting Defenses, Maybe Nobody". New York Times. Archived from the original on May 17, 2014. Retrieved June 27, 2014.
  26. ^ Lemire, Joe (2019-05-23). "A Novel Idea in the Majors: Using Batting Practice to Get Better". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 2019-12-19. Retrieved July 22, 2024.
  27. ^ Schupak, Amanda (June 24, 2015). "What the Houston Astros hack can teach you about cybersecurity". CBS News. Archived from the original on July 21, 2015. Retrieved July 12, 2015.
  28. ^ "O's beef up analytics team as culture shifts". MLB.com. Archived from the original on 2021-11-06. Retrieved 2021-11-08.
  29. ^ a b Diamond, Jared. "How the Baltimore Orioles Pulled Off an Astronomical Turnaround". WSJ. Archived from the original on 2024-05-08. Retrieved July 22, 2024.
  30. ^ Abraham, Peter (2023-09-30). "From losing 110 games to winning 101, Orioles complete impressive rebuild under manager Brandon Hyde - The Boston Globe". Boston Globe. Archived from the original on 2023-10-01. Retrieved July 22, 2024.
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