Turning words into touchdowns: Does speech predict performance?

[masomenos]

Link: http://www.slate.com/id/2292312/pagenum/2

Snippets:

Could it really be true that these innocuous statements can help assess Cam Newton's pro potential? That's the assertion, mission, and business plan of an Ohio-based company called Achievement Metrics. It analyzes the speech of star college players, looking for traits such as "conceptual complexity," "need for power," and "deliberativeness." It compares similar players and correlates these traits with future performance. College wide receivers whose speech shows low levels of distrust, for example, have a greater probability of becoming Pro Bowlers than their less-trusting counterparts.

Players whose language displays both a lack of self-confidence and a high degree of self-centeredness presented a greater risk of being arrested or suspended. For players in the upper-right quadrant, the risk was estimated at 30 percent. Again, this chart deals in probabilities. But if a team is making a $20 million investment in a player, it's useful to know if he shares common traits with players who have a tendency to get in trouble.

Hofmann, as we know, has been gathering the college press conferences of first-round draft picks and analyzing them. Here is one of the charts on quarterbacks:

 

[Chocolate Lab]

Great post. Very interesting.

BTW, I wonder if Newton is the QB who didn't show well. I wouldn't be surprised if it were Mallett.

 

[masomenos]

Great post. Very interesting.

BTW, I wonder if Newton is the QB who didn't show well. I wouldn't be surprised if it were Mallett.

Mallett would be my guess. I wouldn't be surprised if Locker had the highest rating of the QBs mentioned in the article.

 

[Hostile]

I am living proof there is no correlation between talking and touchdowns. I never stopped talking and I was not a touchdown machine.

 

[Rack]

Looking at that chart and location ofcertain qbs on the chart, I would have to say that the chart is pretty much useless.

Still interesting though.

Edit: k took a second look (its not easy viewing this on my phone) I stand corrected. There may be something to this research.