As I searched for potential research opportunities over the summer, I was looking for three things.  First, I wanted to participate in research that gave me the opportunity to learn along the way.  I was hoping that any fellowship I pursued would help supplement my learning during the school year and provide me with tools to prepare for my future.  Ideally, working on a project during the summer would prevent my brain from taking too many steps back before the upcoming fall semester like it seems to do every other year.  Another goal I had was to find an opportunity that embraced the digital nature of research.  The world is becoming increasingly reliant on technology, and the ability to express ideas digitally is only growing more valuable.  My major, statistics, is especially rooted in technology, but even so, tech is not second nature to me.  The best way to improve is through practice, and so I was looking for research that would allow me to do that.  Lastly, I wanted to study something that genuinely interested me.  I know from experience that I, along with most people, work more effectively when the topic is meaningful.  I wanted to get up in the morning and be excited for the tasks I had ahead of me.  The Digital Scholarship Summer Research Fellowship (DSSRF) checks off all three of these boxes.  Through the various workshops and instructional sessions we have, I will be able to expand my knowledge and stay mentally sharp.  I will be introduced to programs and applications that I have never used before, such as WordPress and Tableau.  Additionally, DSSRF enables me to choose my own topic for further exploration, ensuring that I stay motivated throughout the summer.

My goal for the next eight weeks is to take a deep dive into contracts in Major League Baseball.  I want to examine their evolution and understand the statistics behind them.  I also want to see how the statistics that MLB front offices value have changed.  For instance, teams used to care deeply about a hitter’s batting average.  However, batting average and other metrics like it have become secondary to more advanced statistics like OPS (on base + slugging percentage).  So while an elite batting average could have resulted in a lucrative contract 40 years ago, it might not in this day and age.  By the end of the fellowship, I plan to have constructed visualizations showing relationships between salaries and statistics, and I hope to have an interactive model that can be used to predict a player’s salary in the future based on his past performance.  I would also like to include some qualitative information about MLB contracts, specifically on their lengthy histories and minute details that the average fan is unaware of.  

Aside from the new programs I will be introduced to, I hope to learn effective time management skills.  This project has one really big deadline instead of many smaller ones along the way, which is unlike most projects assigned in classes.  I want to finish the summer with a deeper understanding of what works for me when it comes to time management of a long-term project.