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Hawk-Eye tracking system to follow players, ball

The NBA and Sony Sports on Thursday announced a multiyear partnership with Hawk-Eye Innovations that will change how the league tracks its in-game action. Hawk-Eye’s optical tracking technology is designed to capture player and ball movement in real time in three dimensions. The NBA’s adoption of Hawk-Eye technology follows its widespread use in other sports, including tennis and soccer, where it has helped referees quickly review officiating decisions, including offside calls at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
The technology replaces the “center of mass” tracking system used by Second Spectrum, which estimates each player’s location using a single point location. The introduction of “pose tracking” provides new officiating capabilities to support better and faster decision-making, with the intent to increase the accuracy of officiating calls and the speed of play. In addition, the system will give the NBA and its teams the ability to measure and analyze athletic movement in new ways. Sportradar, the NBA’s exclusive data provider, will work alongside Hawk-Eye to allow for the generation of tracking data sets, metrics, advanced stats and insights.
While FOS’ source was unable to speak to the other names on the reported shortlist —which includes Candle Media co-founder and co-CEO Kevin Mayer, and Disney co-chairman Dana Walden — they clarified that Silver is only being considered for the top position, and cannot serve on Disney’s board due to the NBA’s broadcast partnership with the media giant causing a conflict of interest. Silver’s contract with the league runs through 2024.
Duane Rankin: Was told it usually takes #NBA couple of months to approve an owner, but can take shorter or longer. NBA does background check, financial check and more. Mat Ishbia reached agreement Dec. 20 to purchase “a majority stake” in #Suns and #WNBA #Mercury from Robert Sarver for $4B. pic.twitter.com/uGSkkUsmv9
Brad Townsend: Also, Cuban says Mavs called NBA about Giannis taking more than allowed 10 seconds to shoot FTs in teams’ 1st meeting 2 weeks ago. NBA told Mavs it would be called but in Friday’s rematch Giannis took up to 12 seconds. “I have no idea why they didn’t do that in a 1-point game.”
Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos affirmed recent comments from the company that they are not — despite strong indications from insiders as recently as last month — intending to bid on sports rights. “We’ve not seen a profit path” from “renting big-league sports,” the exec shrugged during a keynote session at the UBS Global Technology, Media & Telecom Conference. “We’re not saying there never will be,” he added,” but “dramatically expensive” rights have made sports effectively a “loss leader.”