Job Postings: Los Angeles Dodgers Research & Development Data Scientist & Senior Developer
Just to be clear, there are two separate positions here.
Position: Los Angeles Dodgers Research & Development Data Scientist
Location: Los Angeles
Description:
The Los Angeles Dodgers are seeking a Data Scientist for the team’s Baseball Research and Development (R&D) group. The Data Scientist will work closely with the Director of R&D and our analytics team to research, develop and test mathematical, statistical, and predictive models to support Baseball Operations.
Job Functions:
- Research, develop, and test mathematical, statistical, and predictive models to support Baseball Operations (e.g., player evaluation, roster construction, and in-game decision-making).
- Work with software development team to design and build decision-support systems and tools.
- Provide guidance and technical mentorship to junior analysts.
- Communicate findings directly to key decision-makers within Baseball Operations.
- Recommend sources and techniques for proprietary data collection.
- Perform other related duties as assigned.
Basic Requirements/Qualifications:
- A Ph.D. in Computer Science (Machine Learning), Statistics, Operations Research, or a related field from a top-tier university.
- Minimum of five years’ work experience in mathematical, statistical, and predictive modeling (optimization, statistics, and machine learning).
- Expertise in mathematical and statistical programming (e.g., Python and R).
- Proficiency with SQL and relational databases.
- Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.
- Ability to effectively communicate complex concepts to a non-technical audience.
- Demonstrated desire and ability to act as a mentor to junior analysts.
You should definitely contact us if:
- You want to help build an industry-leading analytics team.
- You love to compete, and you want to see the impact of your work on the field and in the box score.
Compensation:
This position is a full-time position.
To Apply, please send us your resume along with answers to the following questions:
- What date are you available to start?
- Do you have any prior experience working in baseball or sports analytics?
- What experience do you have building mathematical and/or statistical models and in which modeling techniques would you describe yourself as an expert?
- Submit a cover letter and resume online here by June 19th.
…
Position: Los Angeles Dodgers Research & Development Senior Developer
Location: Los Angeles
Description:
The Los Angeles Dodgers are seeking a Senior Developer for the team’s Baseball Research and Development (R&D) group. The Senior Developer will work closely with the Director of R&D and our analytics team to design and build the decision support systems used throughout Baseball Operations. We are looking to find someone who is an expert at translating requirements from diverse sources into design specifications and production code.
Job Functions:
- Design, build, and document decision support systems and tools for Baseball Operations.
- Translate requirements from diverse sources into functional design specifications.
- Architect, build, and test scalable web applications.
- Provide technical mentorship related to system architecture, coding standards, and development processes.
- Write scripts to support data collection, automation, and report generation.
- Perform other related duties as assigned.
Basic Requirements/Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s or Master’s Degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a related field.
- Minimum five years of software development experience in a web-based development environment.
- Experience with both front- and back-end development (full-stack).
- Experience with web (.NET preferred) and scripting (Python preferred) programming languages.
- Familiarity with SQL query design and optimization.
- Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills.
You should definitely contact us if:
- You want to help build an industry-leading analytics team.
- You love to compete, and you want to see the impact of your work on the field and in the box score.
Compensation:
This position is a full-time position.
To Apply, please send us your resume along with answers to the following questions:
- Do you have any prior experience working in baseball or sports analytics?
- Submit a cover letter and resume online here by June 19th.
Paul Swydan used to be the managing editor of The Hardball Times, a writer and editor for FanGraphs and a writer for Boston.com and The Boston Globe. Now, he owns The Silver Unicorn Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Acton, Mass. Follow him on Twitter @Swydan. Follow the store @SilUnicornActon.
I never thought I’d live to see the day when a PhD in Computer Science with five years of experience would actually be compensated for his work!
with a full time position, no less! I wonder what the equity offer is.
I should probably expand upon the equity offer comment
Not sure how much the guys who post these offers read this stuff, but these offers are uniformly terrible, and honestly the lack of discussion of salary here doesn’t serve anyone. I’m assuming by “top university” they mean top 5. This means, more or less, that you’re A) trying to lure people at R1 universities away from their tenure track (or tenured!) positions (most likely) or B) trying to steal someone from a field that hired you out of a top university where you’ve been working for a bit (also possible, but if you survived quals and defended successfully at a top 5 university you went into academia almost exclusively- your committee would have made damn sure you got kicked out if you had let out even an inkling of going into industry before your defense)
For A, in my field, after 5 years in a tenure track position, you are basically up for tenure (which you will get because so few people are capable of doing what you do) at an R1, making $300,000 a year base (again, scarcity of supply and outside options inflate your salary- particularly the salary of the disciplines listed above), and if you’re at a business school like the bright boys who do this (and it’s almost all men in those disciplines, btw) you consult on the side (for equity, if you’re really clever). In order to consider a position like this, you would need to like baseball so much that you would be ok with never talking to your committee people again, they would be so disappointed in you; taking a serious pay cut; or your tenure chances and performance have been so disappointing that not only will you not get tenure at your institution but you won’t be able to get it anywhere else, even a teaching school.
As for B, the discussion for PhD grads in the discussion above at a midlevel startup is 500k and 0.1% equity every year at the start with about a pretty hefty bonus schedule. That’s roughly, if everything works out (and at midlevel/mezzanine and above it usually works out) about 1-1.5 million a year to start. You’ve been there 5 years (too long, honestly), you make quite a bit more than that and might have an eye on your own company or a C-suite position.
These postings are ludicrous, and could be simplified to this: “We’d like Good, Fast, And Cheap, at all three.” I’d love to know if they get anyone who’s not independently wealthy, honestly, and if they don’t work him or her to death within a year.