Joe Sheehan, the Blue Jays’ director of analytics, remembers when he first heard Major League Baseball was working on installing player-tracking technology in every ballpark.

“It was a light-bulb moment,” he said. “I think everybody saw the potential implications.

“We had pitch tracking, we had hit tracking, and if this idea worked we would have some measure of where the fielders were, which opened up a lot of questions that before you were just speculating on. Some of those questions are answerable now.”

Statcast was unveiled to the public last season, but MLB front offices have had access to the reams of data for a few years now. The technology tracks almost every moment in every game, ranging from the exit velocities on batted balls to the route efficiencies, distances covered and foot speed of outfielders, to the revolutions per minute of every pitch and the speed of throws made by every player. This is on top of all the pitch-tracking data that has been collected since 2008.

PART 1:Automated strike zone

PART 2:Ending pitching injuries

For front offices, the biggest gain has been in terms of evaluating defence, which of all the facets of the game has always been the toughest to measure. Teams can now rely on more than just the eye test to judge a player’s range, route efficiency and speed in the field.

“Knowing where the guys are when they start, that has always been something of a blind spot for defensive metrics,” Sheehan said. “You know where the ball ends, but you don’t know how far the guy had to go to get to it. Being able to pin that down has helped us to better start to evaluate defence.”

In order to collect the data, Statcast uses a series of high-resolution optical cameras and radar equipment installed in every major-league ballpark that track the precise location and movement of the ball and every player on the field.

Some teams have been open about how the new information has influenced their decision making.

The Houston Astros plucked Collin McHugh off waivers a couple years ago in part because they liked the spin rate of his curveball, while the New York Mets opted to go with Lucas Duda over Ike Davis at first base last year because of Duda’s higher exit velocities on batted balls.

“There are some questions that it opened up that we didn’t even think to ask before,” Sheehan said. He wouldn’t elaborate any further for fear of divulging state secrets.

The new information is also changing how fans watch and understand the game. Exit velocity is increasingly becoming part of the average fan’s vernacular, and even used on scoreboards in some ballparks.

MLB currently web streams one Statcast-infused game each week with real-time illustration of exit velocities, spin rate and all the other information.

Could some of those elements eventually be incorporated into regular broadcasts or even displayed in the ballpark?

“I can certainly see that happening,” said Mike Petriello, an analyst for MLB.com who focuses on Statcast.

While a pitch’s spin rate can be tough to wrap your head around without also understanding the relevant context, the exit velocity of a batted ball or the foot speed of an outfielder is immediately clear.

The broadcast could show, for instance, how much more ground Jays centre fielder Kevin Pillar typically covers than his counterpart on the opposing team or a potential replacement off the bench.

Petriello concedes it may seem like too much information for the average fan. But most of the information provided by Statcast is more accessible than most advanced statistics.

“You can’t go to a ball game and say, ‘Oh, I saw half a win above replacement today,’ ” he said. “It doesn’t work that way. But you can go and say, ‘I saw Yasiel Puig throw a laser from right field and now I know it was 98 m.p.h. and that’s impressive to me.’ Foot speed, distance covered, batted ball velocity — it’s stuff you’ve always seen and it’s just putting numbers to that stuff.”

For Petriello, what comes next is even more interesting. Could Statcast, for example, one day be able to measure decision-making on the field? Using strength of throw and a base-runner’s speed, could it determine whether an outfielder should have thrown straight home rather than hit the cut-off man for a relay? Could it accurately rate a third-base coach’s decision to wave a runner homer?

“While figuring out the answers to stuff you’ve always wanted to know is cool,” Petriello says, “what’s even cooler is figuring out what the right next question is.”

STATCAST

The top-five tracked plays so far this season:

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Best route efficiency

Carlos Gonzalez — 99.4 per cent

The Colorado Rockies outfielder took the most efficient route over a distance of at least 90 feet this season, according to Statcast, when he ran 105 feet with a near-perfect route to track down Starlin Castro’s fly ball on June 14.

Strongest throw

Aaron Hicks — 105.5 m.p.h.

The Yankees left fielder made the hardest throw in Statcast history earlier this year when he gunned down Oakland’s Danny Valancia — who tried to tag from third on a sacrifice fly — with a 105.5 m.p.h. rocket.

Fastest top speed

Billy Hamilton — 21.6 m.p.h.

The Cincinnati Reds’ speedster scored from second on a passed ball against the Cubs earlier this month, reaching a top speed of 21.6 m.p.h. on the basepaths.

Highest exit velocity home run

Mike Trout — 120.5 m.p.h.

The Marlins’ Giancarlo Stanton is in a league of his own in terms of the exit velocity of his batted balls, but the L.A. Angels’ Trout has the hardest-hit homer so far this season. Trout’s April blast off Kansas City reliever Joakim Soria wasn’t an especially long homer, but he sent it out on a rope at a speed of 120.5 m.p.h.

Highest spin rate

Trout’s teammate, right-hander Garrett Richards, threw a curveball in April that spun at a rate of 3,487 revolutions per minute — the highest spin rate of any pitch tracked this season. He induced a weak groundout from Austin Jackson with the pitch.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated from a previous version that incorrectly stated that Jays outfielder Kevin Pillar had the best route efficiency to a fly ball.