Nonetheless, Davidson admits he envisions software — unmistakably similar to the Cubs’ so-called “Ivy” system — that centralizes information into an efficient and accessible database.
“We want to get to a point where all of our information . . . [is] housed in one system, and that’s a big build,” he said. “[It’ll be] a central housing unit for all your information. It’s the heartbeat of the operation, so you know what’s going on in every area and you don’t have to reach out to 10 different people to try to figure out who they talked to, what they said.”
That information won’t merely be the hockey equivalents of WAR, BABIP, spin rate, exit velocity, the data that prompts defensive shifts and all the other in-game analytics that have made baseball, for better or worse, such a computer-driven game. That information also will include prospect scouting reports, coaching insights, front-office efficiency evaluations and more.
The Hawks will need to hire developers to help build that software — a few of the many personnel changes and additions yet to come this offseason that will round out the leadership structure beneath Davidson, Greenberg and Maciver.
But Greenberg will head the project. That freedom is why he was willing to even consider leaving Addison Street for Madison Street. He talked extensively with former and current Cubs presidents Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer, weighing their advice about organization-building, as well as for him personally, before agreeing to make the move 36 blocks south.
Now only time will tell if he and the Hawks can learn to swim in these uncharted-in-hockey waters.
