Atlanta United's use of sports science should make you feel even better about signing Miguel Almirón

One of the quieter moves of a busy offseason led to its loudest moment

via Atlanta United

---

This one is free. Most of our stuff will not be. If you like this one, consider becoming a paid subscribed (and telling friends to subscribe too) as we head into the season. It will help us keep doing stuff we think y’all will want us to keep doing.

---

Some folks are natural bummers. They have a gift for redirecting celebratory occasions into a black hole of cynicism and the macabre. They’re more than prepared to explain how studies suggest that the Fourth of July fireworks you’re enjoying at the beach will inevitably kill at least one sea turtle, maybe more¹. In fact, they’re relishing the opportunity. They know a thing and they’re going to alert you to the grim reality of the situation without considering suspension of disbelief for the sake of vibes.

Unfortunately, I am one of those people. And I got a reminder of that at Friday’s (re)introductory press conference for Atlanta United’s newest signing, Miguel Almirón. While everyone else celebrated the return of one of the club’s most beloved players, I refrained from blurting out “31! HE’S ABOUT TO TURN 31! WINGERS TEND TO DECLINE SIGNIFICANTLY AT THE TAIL END OF THEIR PRIME AND THERE. ARE. CHARTS.”

Fortunately for me, I got my chance to mention these things once the press conference ended and I (29, young, full of life, thriving) didn’t have to look Almirón (30, practically a senior citizen) in the eye on his big day and ruin everyone’s good time. After the initial round of public questions, media got a chance to talk directly with club president Garth Lagerwey and new sporting director Chris Henderson. And the first thing I did was explain to, Henderson, a former winger, that Almirón is about to turn 31 and that could be bad.

I didn’t expect to come away feeling so reassured.

You might have missed it in the middle of Almirón’s return, Henderson’s reunion with Lagerwey, Ronny Deila’s hiring and Emmanuel Latte Lath’s probable arrival, but, in December, Atlanta United hired David Tenney as their new Director of High Performance. Tenney is one of the most (maybe the most) well-regarded sports scientists in MLS history. That goes back to his time with the Sounders where, unsurprisingly, analytics played a critical role in building his reputation. That includes Seattle becoming the first MLS team to use GPS tracking in practice sessions.

Now, eight years after leaving Seattle, Tenney is in Atlanta. Without him, it’s not clear if Almirón would be here too.

Both Lagerwey and Henderson mentioned Tenney as a factor in the decision to bring Almirón home. And they did it in totally separate interviews.

You’re not going to believe this, but Lagerwey and Henderson are also aware of how old Almirón is. Before bringing him home, they had to weigh the risks involved with an older player who has historically relied on pace to be effective. That means gauging whether or not he can still do the damn thing on the pitch and gauging whether or not he can stay healthy enough to be on the field consistently doing said damn thing.

“Yeah, I mean, we put a lot of research into that,” Henderson said. “We relied a lot on Dave Tenney, who's our new high performance director. He's one of the top in the world. He's excellent. So we leaned on him. You know, we did a ton of research. Same with our data scientist Arjun [Balaraman]. We worked together with him, analyzing everything. And obviously we've all followed Miggy since he left, and it's been fun to watch his career as he grows. And we, as I said, I think he checks every box we're looking for in this position in conjunction with Ronny's ideas of how he wants to play.”

With tools like SkillCorner, Wyscout and GPS tracking, the club can get a complete profile of who Almirón is as a player at 30 years old and a strong understanding of his physical makeup as he heads into his soccer twilight years. They can also rely on Tenney to use those tools to get an accurate assessment of his physical robustness.

Additionally, thanks to another familiar face, Atlanta can utilize Newcastle’s own internal metrics while mixing in their own tests.

“The other thing we looked at, and this is where Dave Tenney is great, he's like, what actually matters is the hamstring strength,” Lagerwey said. “And so there's a metric to measure hamstring strength in terms of, are they at higher risk for injury or not? And [Miguel's] hamstring strength was very good. So despite not playing, we also were able to get metrics from Newcastle. And again, this helps too, where Darren [Eales], on the other side, was very helpful in terms of facilitating. It's a friendly person on both sides, right?

“And so we were able to get a reading of how many days of practice Miguel was available for. And what we heard was he's available virtually every day, his body is strong and in good working order. So now, you know, we hope to get the best of all worlds. He hasn't played quite as many minutes, but his body is in a condition where we still have to ramp him up. You know, we can't just jump him in and play 90 minutes when he played, you know, three games in six months. But we do think that if we're cautious about that and thorough about that—Again, we believe we got an exceptional staff to do that—that we are now going to get them fit and keep them fit from there and he'll have less wear and tear than somebody who might have played the whole season.”

To measure hamstring strength, Tenney utilized a machine from an Australian sports science company named VALD Performance. It’s called a “NordBord.” It looks…comically simple for a piece of equipment that played a notable role in a $12 million transaction.

But it offers very high-level data. In particular, it measures the eccentric strength of an athlete’s hamstring with a noted focus on the biceps femoris.

A few things here:

1. “Eccentric” strength is about control. When you lift weights, the downward motion of a squat is the eccentric movement of the exercise. The upward explosive movement as you come back up is the “concentric.” If you’re doing a lat pulldown, the pulling motion that brings the bar down is the concentric movement while the controlled movement of the bar back up is the eccentric.

2. When talking about “eccentric” movement and hamstrings, we’re essentially talking about the ability of an athlete to hit the brakes effectively. A controlled stop or change of direction out of a sprint is less likely to result in an injury than an out-of-control stop. You can see why this might be a critical factor for soccer players.

3. You’ve got three muscles that make up your hamstrings. The biceps femoris is the one closest to the outside of your body and it’s considered to be the muscle involved in around 80% of what we know broadly as hamstring injuries.

Basically, if your hamstring muscles are strong, you’re less likely to pick up an injury. That’s intuitive enough, right?

The NordBord measures hamstring strength by placing the athlete’s ankles in those two hooks at the end of the board. They’re then asked to do a Nordic curl. You know, this thing.

The athlete’s job is to control their downward movement (eccentric!) as best they can.² The hooks have sensors that gauge how much force is being produced by each leg. You can then take that data to assess hamstring strength, as well as look for potential imbalances in strength in each leg. Strong, balanced hamstrings are good hamstrings. Per one of the most noted performance directors in soccer, Almirón performed well enough on this test and had the metrics elsewhere to merit making a $12 million transaction with confidence.

Now, none of this means Almirón is indestructible. Things happen. Achilles tendons explode without warning etc. etc. But there is at least reason to believe that his age may not be the death sentence I’ve worried about. Optimism is probably too strong a word here all considered, however, there should be something comforting to fans about Atlanta relying on this kind of data, testing and expertise to make the deal rather than gut feelings and probable kit sales.

1. I don’t know if this is actually a thing. Look, it’s early in the morning. It sounds like it could be a thing I guess. All that matters is that it’s enough to ruin some of your day.

2. It is extremely difficult to maintain total control all the way down. Ask a friend to hold your ankles and try it on the floor. Protect your face.