>An American statistics obsessive who persuaded Fulham’s owner to let him dictate transfer policy accused the club of racism and physical threats in an extraordinary Twitter attack after he was sacked last week
>He blocked low budget deals to sign players such as Aaron Mooy, who has become a big Premier League success at Huddersfield Town, and Glenn Murray, shortlisted for the top flight’s player of the month award, because they did not score highly enough on his analytics charts.
>Kline lacked any experience in football but many of his decisions had to be accepted
> In an attempt to create the impression that everything was rosy between him and Jokanovic, Kline proposed that they contrive a ridiculous press conference scene which would go viral.
>Kline’s suggestion, I’m reliably informed, was to propose that he dressed up as a sumo wrestler and burst into one of Jokanovic’s press conferences to challenge him to a fight. At which point, the manager would rip off his clothes to show that he, too, was dressed sumo-style. They would grapple for a few minutes in front of the journalists and, according to the logic, this little sketch would go viral and demonstrate they did actually get on. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Jokanovic turned the idea down.
>To the astonishment of Fulham executives, Kline called the Metropolitan Police after Shahid Khan reiterated to him on Monday that he was no longer wanted at the club. He eventually departed in farcical fashion, discussing his complaints with officers at a picnic bench while chief executive Alistair Mackintosh, chief operating officer Darren Preston and Jokanovic waited in an office at the Motspur Park training ground, to see if officers wanted to speak to them. They did not.
Nolan Hughes
>Kline’s suggestion, I’m reliably informed, was to propose that he dressed up as a sumo wrestler and burst into one of Jokanovic’s press conferences to challenge him to a fight. At which point, the manager would rip off his clothes to show that he, too, was dressed sumo-style. They would grapple for a few minutes in front of the journalists and, according to the logic, this little sketch would go viral and demonstrate they did actually get on. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Jokanovic turned the idea down.
Grayson Thompson
forgot to include the "racism" part
>The decision not to buy one striker of mixed race brought accusations of racism against the scouting staff. After Kline and Tony Khan built a power base known as ‘the data team’, which included a senior scout at the club, Rigg left the club last December. Kline then began dominating transfer policy far more.
So they hire someone with zero experience in football. He makes up some stats model for a sport he knows nothing about. Manager doesn't agree with the recommendations of this moron. >y-you don't agree because you're racist
Manager wanted to sign Mooy and Abraham but this clown said they had bad "stats" in his model.
David Anderson
what the fuck
is this shit real or did you copy it from some sports related onion tier site?
Isaac Brooks
Very real. He was sacked last week
Nathaniel Phillips
jesus fucking christ,how dumb is that owner If I entered some business I know nothing about I'd get someone with a good track record in it to help me out, not hire some jabroni just cause he's friends with my son what the fuck
Luis Ward
>statkneels
Wyatt Cook
This guy might be clown but face it, stats are the future
Landon Scott
Should keep michael jackson statue desu
Bentley Baker
>Kline is friends with owner Shahid Khan’s son Tony why do shitskins always incur in nepotism? this is the result of thirld world mentality 2bh
Robert Long
>Fulham have been in a state of civil war over Kline’s insistence that no player who fell below a specific numerical rating on his data model - which he has refused to divulge details of internally - could be signed.
So he literally was just making shit up as he went along, if not for this crazy racist stuff he'd be a legend
Angel Scott
>you now remember Fulham hiring Felix Magath that was fun
Brandon Richardson
This reminds me of the time those gfh fucktards refused to sign ashley barnes because he was lower rated in FM than Luke Varney. Arabs,not even once
Joshua Howard
...
Robert Allen
I bet this fucker just watched moneyball and thought it'd be easy.
why is it that it's always an american who's the mongoloid in these stories?
Bentley Williams
>I bet this fucker just watched moneyball and thought it'd be easy. Brentford have been trying that to no success.
Caleb Rogers
The bigger question is why did Fulham sell themselves to this shitskin who isn't even that wealthy?
Nathaniel Gray
>why is it that it's always an american who's the mongoloid in these stories? It's a case of >tf >tt. The rest of the world has already figured out that stats aren't all that useful for football.
Jaxon Long
>(((Kline)))
Don't tell me, pure coincidence, right?
Jacob Morgan
Stats are literally the past
Cameron Thompson
Any Fulhambros that can tell me how my nigga Rafa has been so far!?
And Rui Fonte too
Easton Peterson
Quälix is doing well in China. Fullem were just too plebeian to understand his genius.
Joseph Watson
From what I've seen rui fonte's decision making is awful and he's been all but anonymous, Soares has just been anonymous
Jeremiah Gonzalez
not in football
they're only relevant in low-technique set-piece sports like american football and baseball
Andrew Wood
shahid khan's net worth is around 7 billion usd, isn't that enough to own fulham? also, they didn't sold themselves, the former owner (al fayed) decided to sell the team
James Phillips
Statistical analysis is already in use throughout the top flight. Your inability to perceive its already apparent impact and revolutionary potential is indicative of your lacking imagination. Nothing that happens on a football pitch is beyond the reach of modern analytics systems. We're literally decades from football players being replaced by robots, how do YOU think these future beings will organize their perceptions?
John Phillips
That's what I was thinking. Usually it's Klein but I think this one will turn up ((()))
Angel Jackson
I was reading the Fulham forum to see what they're saying about this story. They don't like Fonte.
Justin Mitchell
he did nothing wrong
Nolan Wood
that only really covers the physical side of the game, football is known for the unreliability of its stats
Hudson Phillips
Stats are used loads in football. Stats are the future but most people don't know how to use them properly and that's why the whole 'stats are useless in football' thing come
Anthony Reyes
>players being replaced by robots I challenge anyone to top the Americanness of this post
Christopher Fisher
He is ahead of his time. The problem is that the stats aren't advanced enough for soccer yet. Once computer vision improves some more scouts will be obsolete and the second-order stats that the computers will be deriving won't even be comprehensible to humans in terms of mapping them to concepts that we are familiar with.
It's like how WAR or any of the advanced metrics in baseball don't map directly to anything we normally care about but are tremendously reliable indicators of player performance.
Carter Perez
stats are unreliable because they have trouble factoring in throwing of games and player response to getting a fat guaranteed contract
Matthew Long
>'There was an away game where we played poorly and we got off the bus and he said, "Right I want everyone in tomorrow at eight o'clock and we are going to train" >'So we got in and went outside, there were no balls coming out with us so we were all thinking, "Right OK," so he's just gone, "Right the formation yesterday, can you get in your positions." So we got out on the pitch, the goalkeeper, back four, midfield four and two strikers stood there and he said, "Right you didn't want to run around yesterday, we are not going to run around today" and he just blew the whistle and said everyone just stand still and we just had to stand still. >'It was a cold day too, and there were a couple of lads with gloves on, they were off straight away, there were leaves blowing across the pitch, you couldn't make eye contact with anyone you had to just stand there and we were there for about 40 minutes just standing there. And he would just walk around, then stop, and walk around to the other side of the pitch and stop.'
Michael Smith
only if applied correctly. even with statistics you have to know what you are doing