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TV spots

As a part of my involvement with the IBM Interactive Experience group, which among many other things are responsible for the work that IBM does as a part of the sponsorship for a number of high-profile sports events, I have had a chance to provide the information required for TV spots related to the projects that I have worked on.

These include my deep involvement in the analytics of the data from the four major tennis tournaments and work that I have completed in connection with the Masters golf tournament at Augusta National.

Can your cloud help you compete?

Dominic Cooper is featured in this TV spot and talking about how the US Open tennis tournament is analyzing 41 million data points to uncover the Keys to the Match and is running on the IBM Cloud.

I compiled and curated all of the statistics referenced in this commercial and had a chance to review the script and provide corrections before it was produced.

Serena Williams, Dominic Cooper, and tennis

2014

Serena Williams + IBM Watson on performance

2016

Watson tells Serena Williams that, when down a point, she serves an ace 5.8x more than other top players.

This information was one of the insight that I derived about Serena Williams from the data collected at the four major tennis tournaments that also make up the foundation of the Keys to the Match.

ESPN's introduction to the IBM Insights

Narrated by ESPN's Tom Rinaldi, this is the introduction to the IBM Insights when the solution was first introduced to the viewers during the second week of the 2012 Wimbledon tournament.

I worked with ESPN's production team to author the narration of the introduction to ensure that it accurately reflected my work.

The pictures used for this introduction were updated for each tournament but the narration stayed the same.

My only regret about this is that I did not get a chance to appear in the background shots from the IBM control center that are included in this introduction. However, during the tournaments where we collaborated with ESPN, I was not working in the IBM control center but rather out of the ESPN production facilities as I needed quick and easy access to both the commentators and the production team.

Tom Watson + IBM Watson on the Weather

A recurring theme in the interview was Tom Watson's belief that he has an advantage in poor weather over most of the other professional players.

When examining the data from Tom Watson's performances at the Masters, I found that he excelled in poor weather conditions, such as wind and rain.

The factoid delivered by IBM Watson about Tom Watson playing 1.2 strokes better than others in poor weather came directly from my work and was based on a regression analysis of his performance compared to the rest of the field.

Tom Watson at the Masters golf tournament

Leading up to Tom Watson's last appearance at the Masters golf tournament in the spring of 2016, we produced a series of TV spots that featured the retiring Tom Watson in conversation with IBM Watson.

The information in the spots is primarily based on a lengthy interview with Tom Watson to get his perspective on what made him successful and on his thoughts on the influence of data collection and analysis in the sport.

Tom Watson + IBM Watson on the Future

This spot is mostly of a nostalgic nature and setting up a future where IBM Watson will be used more extensively in golf and other professional sports.