Handball Analytics: Adapting xT and VAEP for Player Evaluation
A groundbreaking study introduces the first adaptation of expected Threat (xT) and Value Added Event Pass (VAEP) metrics for handball, utilizing five seasons of tracking data from Handball Bundesliga. The new metric, H-xT, employs handball-specific court zoning, proving more effective than traditional rectangular grids in simulations. Meanwhile, H-VAEP is designed to mitigate team-identity leakage and provides stable, discriminative player ratings. This research, which addresses the shortcomings of conventional handball statistics, is accessible on arXiv under the identifier 2608.12926.
Key facts
- First adaptation of xT and VAEP to handball
- Uses five seasons of Handball Bundesliga tracking data
- H-xT uses handball-native court zoning
- H-xT more robust than rectangular grids in simulations
- H-VAEP optimized to limit team-identity leakage
- H-VAEP yields stable and discriminative ratings
- Paper available on arXiv (2608.12926)
- Addresses limitations of traditional handball metrics
Entities
Institutions
- Handball Bundesliga
- arXiv