RAW Data and Beyond: Spikeball Tour Stop Finals – Winter Haven, FL
RAW Data and Beyond: Spikeball Tour Stop Finals – Winter Haven, FL
This article is covering the Winter Haven Tour Stop Finals where 1-2-4 Skyball (Fredric Hinkle & Coleman Epperson) defeated Knotty (Jarratt Rouse & Ryan Fitzgerald) in three games with scores 21-19, 19-21, 21-17.
A big shout out to Spikeball for purchasing stats for Pro, Premier, and Women’s divisions at every Tour Stop this year – if you want to check out more stats from these tournaments you can find it all here .
In Florida, we saw the clashing of two very different play styles – old school defense vs new age serving. It was a fitting reintroduction to the national roundnet scene. We saw 2019 established powerhouses face off against two players who vaulted up the ranks during the 2020 hiatus. Boasting two all-time-great defenders in Ryan Fitzgerald and Jarratt Rouse, it was no surprise that Knotty played a defense-first strategy, but were Fredric Hinkle and Coleman Epperson actually a serve-only mash-up team? Let’s see what the stats have to say.
At a Glance
1-2-4 Skyball dominated Knotty from the service line, claiming 15 aces compared to Knotty’s 2.
Fitzgerald and Rouse leaned into their strengths and won the defensive battle, recording 21 defensive touches to Hinkle and Epperson’s 16.
Ultimately, Knotty’s 5 more defensive touches were not enough to overcome 1-2-4 Skyball’s serving advantage. Or, put simply, when 1 out of every 4 of your serves is an ace, you’re probably going to win
These radar graphs provide a visual snapshot of a player’s overall performance in the series. The 8 statistics presented here describe how a player performed across different aspects of the game. The results are plotted along each statistic’s axis and then connected, creating a shape that is easy to interpret. For instance, here you can see that Hinkle had a more complete performance than Fitzgerald by noting the larger surface area of his blue shape.
To learn more about how the statistics in these graphs are calculated, check out the glossary at the end of this article.
Digging Deeper
As expected, Knotty excelled on defense, but more impressive than their defensive touches was their ability to convert them. While Rouse was doing his best brick wall impression, recording 13 defensive touches in the series, Fitzgerald was putting on a setting masterclass with 7 strong sets. This undoubtedly played a role in Rouse’s top-performing 7 defensive touches returned to net.
Exploring the advanced metrics can shed more light on their defense. Take for instance Adjusted Defensive Touches (ADT); this metric uses whether or not the ball was returned to the net as a proxy for quality of defensive touch – we assume a better defensive touch is more likely to be put back on the net.
Using ADT allows us to better gauge defensive efficiency. Rouse was clearly the most prolific defender on the net based on total defensive touches (13) and strong defensive touches (2) but it is also backed up by his series-leading ADT of 3.33. We can take this a step further and use the ADT of other players to distinguish between the defenders and the pretenders.
Looking only at total defensive touches, Epperson (9), Fitzgerald (8), and Hinkle (7) appear to have performed similarly. However, a closer look at their ADTs of 2.17, 2, and 1.17, respectively, show that Hinkles’s impact was significantly lower despite a similar volume. While this does not mean Hinkle is a bad defender – a defensive touch is nothing to balk at – it does highlight a lack of efficiency from 1-2-4 Skyball as a team to convert defense touches.
This is further reinforced when you consider Knotty scored a team average 2.67 ADT compared to 1-2-4 Skyball’s 1.67. Simply put, Rouse and Fitzgerald each recorded 1 more quality touch per game than Hinkle and Epperson. This opens the door for 2 more breaks per game based solely on defense, which is hugely significant! Despite this defensive advantage, Knotty was simply outmatched from the service line – but you do not need advanced metrics to see that, all you need is RAW’s Serve Center.
Serve Center
1-2-4 Skyball dominated Knotty from 7 feet, claiming 15 aces compared to Knotty’s 2. Hinkle and Epperson also performed exceptionally well from an efficiency standpoint acing Knotty with over 25% of their serves. But looking beyond the “what”, we want to know the “why” and the “how” behind 1-2-4 Skyball’s serving excellence — and for that let’s check out some key takeaways from RAW’s Serve Center.
Hinkle: A consistent power server with the ability to explode
Most Common Serve : Right Straight
Hinkle’s bread and butter serve at a 50% Usage rate, it carries less risk as compared to other serves but still carries a threat because of his sheer speed. It is insane that this is his “put-on” serve.
Most Effective Serve : Right Cut
Highly effective on high volume, this is a high risk, high reward serve – with a Serve On % of only 33% but when it lands it is lethal with an Ace % of 85%!
Best Change-of-Pace Serve : Right Push
A low volume serve that did not miss, Hinkle sprinkled it in to great effect with a 40% Ace % and a 60% Break %.
Epperson: A classic cut server who will crush you with the off-speed pitch
Most Common Serve : Right Cut
A largely ineffective serve considering the high volume and 21% Serve On %, but Epperson used it to set up his other serves which were incredibly effective.
Most Effective Serve : Right Push
The classic 1-2 punch was used to devastating effect with a 33% Ace % and 50% Break %.
Best Change-of-Pace Serve : Right Drop
Maybe we should call it the classic 1-2-3 punch, as Epperson’s drop recorded a 50% Ace %!
Rouse: A swiss army knife from seven who will test you more with his serve diversity than his serve quality
Most Common Serve : Right Straight
Far and away Rouse’s most used serve, it was unfortunately one of his least effective – yielding no aces and allowing for minimal opportunities for defense with a 19% Serve On %.
Most Effective Serve : Right Drop
The series’ most diverse server, Rouse used 9 serves, but his most effective serve was his right drop which also gave him a clutch ace in game 1.
Best Change-of-Pace Serve : Left Cut
It’s important to note that this serve may have a higher volume of attempts in reality since there are 5 “Left Unknowns” (most likely Left Rims) that could have been designated as cuts if they had hit the net.
Fitzgerald: An OG straight server who is more interested in setting up a defensive touch than forcing a bad one
Most Common Serve : Right Straight
With no aces and only 6% Forced Weak Receive %, he is clearly a server that was playing to get the serve on so he could play defense, but unfortunately he only hit 50% of his serves.
Most Effective Serve : Fwango Straight
Fitzgerald should consider using his fwango (backhand) at a higher volume since he had a Break % of 33%. *Note* in RAW’s data, the “Fwango” category tracks both backhands and fwangos
Best Change-of-Pace Serve : Right Drop
With 4 of the 5 drops coming on first serve, he was likely using this dependable drop strategically rather than dropping on second to avoid a double fault.
RAWards
Stats Glossary
Here list of the definitions for common metrics used in this article. For a full glossary of metrics and designations used to by RAW, check out RAW’s Statistics Glossary . For insight into the guidelines that determine our strong and weak designations, check out RAW’s Designation Standards
| Roundnet Plus Minus | RPM | (Breaks – Broken) / # of games |
| Ace % | A% | Aces / Total Serves |
| Serve On % | SVO % | Serves Made / Total Serves |
| Aced % | AD% | Aced / Total Serves Faced |
| Setting Plus Minus | STPM | ((Strong Sets – Weak Sets – Setting Errors) * Partner Put Away %) / # of games If Weak Sets + Setting Errors > Strong Sets then multiply by (1 – Partner Put Away %) instead |
| Put Away % | PA% | Put Aways / Total Hits |
| Adjusted Defensive Touches | ADT | (Defensive Touches Returned + 1/2 * Defensive Touches Not Returned) / # of games |
| Errors | E | Hitting Errors + Defensive Touch Errors + Setting Errors |
Thank you for reading and be on the lookout for future articles as a part of this series – up next is an awesome matchup from Garland between Assistive Touch (Hammon/Marshall) and Garrett .50 Kylebur (Hornok/Ackermann).
We will be tracking the state of the game from an analytics perspective for every Spikeball Tour Stop Finals as the season progresses. So make sure to check back to see how other series compare to Florida’s “barely-Serveball” Final
Brian Childs
Lefty On Two Stats Correspondent
RAW Co-Founder
If you are interested in getting stats for a tournament you are hosting or playing in, reach out to [email protected] or visit roundnetstats.com for more information.
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