Sports Math: An Introductory Course in the Mathematics of Sports Science and Sports Analytics (Textbooks in Mathematics)

Sports Math: An Introductory Course in the Mathematics of Sports Science and Sports Analytics (Textbooks in Mathematics)

by Roland B. Minton (Author)

Synopsis

Can you really keep your eye on the ball? How is massive data collection changing sports?

Sports science courses are growing in popularity. The author's course at Roanoke College is a mix of physics, physiology, mathematics, and statistics. Many students of both genders find it exciting to think about sports. Sports problems are easy to create and state, even for students who do not live sports 24/7. Sports are part of their culture and knowledge base, and the opportunity to be an expert on some area of sports is invigorating. This should be the primary reason for the growth of mathematics of sports courses: the topic provides intrinsic motivation for students to do their best work.

From the Author:

The topics covered in Sports Science and Sports Analytics courses vary widely. To use a golfing analogy, writing a book like this is like hitting a drive at a driving range; there are many directions you can go without going out of bounds. At the driving range, I pick out a small target to focus on, and that is what I have done here. I have chosen a sample of topics I find very interesting. Ideally, users of this book will have enough to choose from to suit whichever version of a sports course is being run.

The book is very appealing to teach from as well as to learn from. Students seem to have a growing interest in ways to apply traditionally different areas to solve problems. This, coupled with an enthusiasm for sports, makes Dr. Minton's book appealing to me. -Kevin Hutson, Furman University

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More Information

Format: Hardcover
Pages: 256
Edition: 1
Publisher: Chapman and Hall/CRC
Published: 16 Sep 2016

ISBN 10: 1498706266
ISBN 13: 9781498706261

Media Reviews

The book is written at a level that is accessible to a large audience. It contains a small number of applications that make use of calculus; otherwise, only a high school level mathematics background is required. Furthermore, one can easily skip over those sections that require calculus and still have plenty of accessible material to read.

Sports Math is well written and easy to read. The book should appeal to anyone interested in the quantitative aspects of athletics. Each chapter of the books ends with a fairly large number of exercises and also pointers to further reading. Thus, the book could be used not only as a textbook for a course but also as a nice resource for student projects.

~Mathematical Reviews, 2017

Minton presents a textbook based on the current status of a sport science course that has evolved since he began teaching it in 1988. He offers a sample of topics that he knows something about and finds interesting, and hopes that instructors and students will find the book useful. His topics are projectile motion, rotational motion, sports illusions, collisions, ratings systems, voting systems, saber- and other metrics, randomness in sports, sports strategies, and big data and beyond.

~ProtoView, 2017

Author Bio
Roland Minton is professor of Mathematics at Roanoke College, Salem, Virginia. He has taught courses in sports science since 1987.