KENT, Wash., Oct. 9, 2018 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- PickleballTournaments.com today announced their partnership agreement with Grantstone Ventures to benefit both companies in providing pickleball player ratings data. As part of the agreement, Grantstone is collaborating with PickleballTournaments.com to introduce player ratings, rankings, and other player data to the pickleball marketplace. These data tools will benefit tournament directors, players and clubs, further enhancing the sport's growth and development. The companies began an informal relationship in 2015, then introduced their first formal joint offering during June of 2018, launching a new pickleball player ratings system in conjunction with the USAPA. The third phase of the new USAPA Tournament Rating system was released September 30, 2018.
As the sport continues to experience remarkable growth, having tools for tournament directors and organizations to match play more fairly and effectively is a critical element in creating successful events with even levels of competition. "From day one, our goal has been to provide ratings that are objective, accurate, and timely for players globally. This partnership with Pickleball Tournaments will greatly increase our ability to achieve that mission," shared Kevin Richards, CEO and co-founder of Grantstone Ventures.
The USAPA Tournament Ratings developed by PickleballTournaments.com and Grantstone Ventures introduces a new 4-digit rating (for example 3.786), which is much more precise than the 2-digit skill ratings (such as 3.5) used by most players, clubs, and instructors to describe a player's general skill level. Based on statistical data, the 4-digit rating maps to a player's 2-digit skill level. For example, a player rating of 3.994 maps to a 3.5 skill level and a 4.014 rating maps to a 4.0 skill level. The new USAPA Tournament Ratings are calculated for five categories (Men's Singles, Women's Singles, Men's Doubles, Women's Doubles and Mixed Doubles).
With their extensive data science expertise, the team at Grantstone Ventures developed a set of tools to improve the experience players have when playing in recreational settings as well as tournaments. Their Clique & Club (C&C) program, which will be marketed jointly by both entities, enables clubs and other private groups to accurately rate their members, thereby improving seedings and competitive play in leagues, ladders and round-robins. These groups will enjoy an easy onboarding process in order to track player progress over time. Like the USAPA Tournament Ratings, Clique & Club Ratings are processed from Grantstone Ventures proprietary ratings engine, Deep GreenTM, derived from the widely acknowledged benchmark Elo algorithm, and are based on the commonly used ratings scale. C&C Ratings will also use four digits instead of just two but will not include match results from public tournaments.
"We are excited to work with the data scientists at Grantstone," shared David Johnson, PickleballTournament.com COO. "They have invested almost 36 months in the development of an extremely thoughtful approach to player ratings that will help pickleball tournament directors better rank and seed players at tournaments. Replacing human evaluation with data removes subjectivity, creating a better experience for all players as well as anyone who organizes matches."
Over time the companies intend to enhance and leverage the data collected by PickleballTournaments.com to help players learn more about their opponents and improve historical reporting of player ratings. The agreement also spans product marketing and development opportunities in other segments of the pickleball marketplace. The companies will be collaborating on other tools and products for clubs, leagues, and social play.
About PickleballTournaments.com
Founded in 2004, PickleballTournaments.com has helped run thousands of pickleball tournaments by providing software, event management, training and consulting services to Tournament Directors around the world. PickleballTournaments.com powers the largest, most prestigious pickleball events in the world including the USAPA Nationals, US Open Pickleball Championships, the Huntsman Games, National Senior Games and hundreds more each year. Serving the needs of over 40,000 active players, and over 500 tournament directors, the company is devoted 100% to pickleball. PickleballTournaments.com operates as a division of Pickleball Station, Inc. – an affiliate company of Pickleball Central.
About Grantstone Ventures
Founded in 2015, the first undertaking to improve the sporting experience using cutting edge technology by Grantstone Ventures was PickleballRatings.com. Co-founders Kevin Richards (Operations and Marketing) and Brian Hendrickson (Technology) are entrepreneurs who live and play in Portland, OR.
SOURCE PickleballTournaments.com
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