Data Scientist

Department: Baseball Research & Development

Primary Purpose
The Cleveland Guardians Baseball Research & Development (R&D) group is seeking data scientists at a variety of experience levels, including senior, entry-level, and interns/fellows. Prior experience with sports is not necessary if you have some curiosity or interest in learning about data science applications in baseball.

If you enjoy tackling challenging problems, using interesting real data, collaborating with smart people, and having a direct impact on what happens on the baseball field and in our business, this may be the opportunity for you!

People in this role will use statistical and machine learning techniques to better understand and quantify the game of baseball. You will analyze video, player tracking, and biomechanics data as well as traditional baseball data sources like box scores to help us acquire and develop baseball players into a championship-caliber team. You will work alongside the rest of the R&D, data engineering, and IT groups, and interact with coaches, scouts, and executives from across the organization.

The Cleveland Guardians prefer our employees (or teammates) reside in Cleveland, Ohio, but we will consider and discuss the possibility of remote work.

If you meet some of the qualifications below, we encourage you to apply or reach out for more information. We know that historically marginalized groups – including people of color, women, people from working class backgrounds, and people who identify as LGBTQ – are less likely to apply unless and until they meet every requirement for a job. We encourage you to reach out if you have questions about the role or your qualifications. We are happy to help you feel ready to apply!

Responsibilities

• Design, build, test, and deploy statistical and/or machine learning models to support all facets of baseball operations, including scouting, player development, and the major league team.
• Explain methods, results and corresponding actionable insights to key stakeholders across the organization.

Basic Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience in a quantitative field such as Statistics, Computer Science, Economics, Machine Learning, or Operations Research.
• Demonstrated understanding of statistics and associated quantitative methods, including the tradeoffs between different techniques.
• Demonstrated experience completing statistics and/or machine learning projects from beginning to end.

• Demonstrated experience working with large data sets in a programming language such as R or Python.
• Desire to learn about data science applications in baseball. Prior experience with baseball data is a plus but not necessary.

Preferred Experience

• Advanced degree or equivalent experience in a quantitative field such as Statistics, Computer Science, Economics, Machine Learning, or Operations Research.
• Demonstrated research experience in a sports context (baseball is a plus).
• Demonstrated experience with a database language such as SQL.
• Demonstrated experience with deep learning frameworks such as Tensorflow or PyTorch.
• Demonstrated experience with computer vision.
• Demonstrated experience working with high-dimensional spatiotemporal data.
• Demonstrated experience with Bayesian statistics.

Standard Requirements

• Represent the Cleveland Guardians in a positive fashion to all business partners and the general public.
• Ability to develop and maintain successful working relationships with members of the Front Office.
• Ability to act according to organizational values and service excellence at all times.
• Ability to work with multicultural populations and have a commitment to fairness and equality.
• Ability to work in a diverse and changing environment.

About Us
Our teammates are at the core of what we believe in: People, Collaboration, Learning, and Excellence (PeopleCLE). We look to hire individuals who are committed to our purpose of uniting and inspiring our city with the power of team. Our mission is to win the World Series while creating a compelling fan experience.

We believe that we will achieve our goals by making evidence and model-based decisions and creating environments that support our people and empower them to continuously learn. This role might be for you if you are looking to join a team that works together to learn new ways to make model-based decisions that lead to excellent outcomes.

We also pride ourselves on creating an attractive work environment highlighted by a healthy work-life balance, exceptional benefits such as health, vision, and dental coverage, and competitive 401k plan with employer contribution and match.

Our Hiring Process

1. A short, three question questionnaire to help us get to know you better than we do from just your application. No coding involved.
2. Two approximately 30-minute phone calls.
3. A longer take-home questionnaire to help us learn how you think through problems. No coding or project involved.
4. A final round of interviews with our R&D department as well as teammates across Baseball Operations.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

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Software Engineer

Department: Baseball Systems
Employment Type: Full-Time, Exempt

Primary Purpose
The Cleveland Guardians are seeking a Software Engineer to join their Baseball Systems Engineering team. In this position, you will have the opportunity to gain exposure to a variety of tasks – including, but not limited to, software engineering, data warehousing, and UX/UI design & development – that directly impact the organization’s ability to acquire, develop, and deploy players. Depending on your preferences, we will work with you to craft a role that either specializes in one of these areas or allows you to contribute across multiple areas. The software and data products you help build will facilitate operations and enhance decision-making across all areas of the organization, helping to answer questions such as “which trades should we execute,” “who should we select with our next pick in the draft,” and “how can we show players their data from yesterday’s game?” The position offers the opportunity to collaborate and help craft innovative solutions to challenging problems, grow from both an engineering and leadership standpoint, and work with teammates side by side in pursuit of the organization’s ultimate mission – winning the World Series.

As a Software Engineer with the Cleveland Guardians, you will have the opportunity to:
From a front-end engineering perspective…

• Learn from experienced engineers and work within a modern web stack, using Vue, Node, Nest, D3, etc.
• Work closely with your product team to discover competitive advantages in player acquisition and player development, and build interactive software and web pages to realize those advantages

• Identify inefficiencies in our users’ processes that can only be solved with user-friendly software

• Rapidly prototype new/innovative solutions and demonstrate them to your product team, end-users, and Baseball Operations leadership
• Contribute to the holistic design process and help shape how we work in the future
• Have regular opportunities to engage with, and learn from, our Baseball Operations leadership group

From a back-end engineering perspective…

• Build robust data systems that improve the backbone of our data-first applications
• Transform both internal and external data sources into our central data warehouse
• Work closely with your product team and other software engineers to determine technical requirements and turn them into accessible and secure data endpoints (e.g., direct SQL, BI tools, REST)

• Collaborate with our R&D team to help move statistical/machine learning models into production

• Collaborate with our Infrastructure team to troubleshoot/enhance performance and query costs across both cloud and on-premises environments
• Be an active participant in identifying, evolving, and evangelizing data engineering best practices, constantly challenging the status quo and improving our data engineering standards

Base Requirements Needed, you should have:

• Demonstrated experience or degree in a field such as Computer Science or another STEM program
• Demonstrated experience writing user-facing application code
• A proven ability to work within tight timelines and iterate quickly
• Effective communication skills and the ability to collaborate within a cross-functional team
• A desire to learn and grow not only as a programmer, but also as a person
• A passion for baseball/sports, or a willingness to learn more about the game

Standard Requirements

• Represents the Cleveland Guardians in a positive fashion to all business partners and the general public
• Ability to develop and maintain successful working relationships with members of the Front Office
• Ability to act accordingly to organizational values and service excellence at all times
• Ability to work with multicultural populations and have a commitment to fairness and equality
• Ability to work in a diverse and changing environment

About Us
In Baseball Operations and Baseball Systems, our shared goal is to identify and develop diverse players and front office teammates who contribute to our mission. By working together effectively and collaboratively, we create a family atmosphere that supports learning as we strive for excellence in everything we do. We believe that we will achieve our goals by making evidence-based decisions and creating environments that support our people and empower them to learn.

We know that people from historically marginalized groups and those who have not yet had direct experience in the sports industry are less likely to apply for a job unless they meet every requirement. That being said, we encourage anyone who meets some of the qualifications above to apply or reach out for more information.

The Cleveland Guardians are an Equal Opportunity Employer.

To Apply:
To apply, please follow this link.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Cleveland Guardians.