Balance Of Power Stat Debuts In Miami, Medvedev Is Case In Point

How many times have you heard a player say that being more aggressive underpinned his victory? Surely more times than you have heard a player say that he turned around a match by playing more defensively!

Until now, we’ve accepted that attacking play typically is rewarded with a victory. A new tool now allows us to prove the thesis and dig deeper to better explain the narrative.

Tennis Data Innovations, formed in 2020 to enrich fans’ enjoyment and understanding of tennis through data, is launching a new metric called Balance of Power, which shows the percentage of shots played in offense, neutral and defence by both players.

The metric made its debut Saturday at the Miami Open presented by Itau across ATP Media’s World Feed broadcast. And it emphatically showed that Daniil Medvedev controlled the Balance of Power in his convincing 6-4, 6-2 win over Andy Murray, with a strong six percentage point advantage (24% to 18%).

And here’s a headline-grabbing stat for fans, players and coaches that the new data reveal: A player who spends more time in offense wins 68% of matches.

The BOP metric is dynamically calculated during every shot by proprietary software that analyses a range of data points including:

• Quality of the incoming ball
• Both players’ court position
• Opponent’s recovery position
• Players’ body position when hitting the shot (e.g. are they in a strong, balanced position or are they hitting while stretched?)

On average, ATP Tour players spend 22% of their time in offense, 22% in defence and 56% in neutral positions. If a player can shift the BOP by just two percentage points in his favour (e.g. 25% versus 23% for his opponent), his chance of winning the match is 64%.

Should the BOP power differential reach eight percentage points or greater, a player’s chance of winning the match increases to 72%

Balance of Power is just the first of several new data points TDI will be unveiling in coming months. Rolling out next will be a deeper dive into Balance of Power, measuring the ratio of points won from offensive and defensive positions.