Major League Baseball (MLB) is the premier, professional baseball league,  entertaining viewers with strategic gameplay, and exceptional athleticism. Our Player-Centric redesign extends the brand intent and increases touchpoints through richer connections with athletes.

I was mainly responsible for precedent research, product strategy, user research, copywriting, prototyping, and producing the product videos.

Researching our client has revealed a dip in viewership and long-term engagement, particularly in the young adult demographic.

Through the competitive analysis I carried out, young adult viewers appeared to respond well to seeing and connecting to the personality of athletes.

but the current fractured MLB media landscape, long game run-time, large roster of MLB athletes and lack of prominent stars all hinder product engagement.

A notable business precedent is the F1 documentary series "Drive to Survive", which has successfully brought in a new audience by forging richer bonds between viewers and athletes by humanizing the drivers of the Formula One World Championships.

In order to better understand our customers, I led the user research efforts with an initial questionnaire, which was distributed on forums with large population of MLB consumers.
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Initial survey results revealed that a major pain point arose from the media blackout surrounding live games, long runtime of games, and the dense, technical jargon of baseball. This is compounded by MLB having the longest running seasons of professional league sports. It was hard for casual viewers to stay engaged with the sport and its athletes.

Our solution was initially intended only for the MLB mobile application. The intent was to meet the viewers when they engaged in independent research of game clips and athletes in order to maintain said engagement that is housed all in one place.

In order to get feedback from our target demographic, I created the user testing script, and with the aid of another teammate, conducted initial user tests with 4 individuals.

Participants responded positively to all proposed features, and noted that these features would increase desire to engage with the app, and the brand by proxy. However, user testing and secondary research revealed an insight; player-centric media is scattered across the digital landscape.

I created a product strategy outline, which aimed to funnel consumers and customers into the MLB app with an aggregate of humanizing and personable player information on the MLB app.

In accordance with the content strategy,  the MLB website was included, acting as an entry funnel. This pivot created a more directed solution for converting web users to adopt a unified platform directly controlled by MLB which many viewers were already using.

I also created the information architecture of the redesign.

Features like "Up to Bat" and player profiles were designed for easy live game access and digestible content, aiming to provide value for customers to engage with the app. Customers can engage at their own pace and reduce the commitment of following the 162 games per season.

The player profile page is crafted for fans to explore and discover new players through highlights, aiming to enhance player recognition as fans scroll through the content.

Adhering to the content strategy of surfacing a large variety of relevant player news and information, I worked alongside our visual designer to create a material design system which could be adapted across MLB’s web and app interfaces for 900+ different players. Thus ensuring a cohesive user experience.

Informed by my content strategy, the player profile page features dynamic visuals, like action shot GIFs in the hero section, to vividly depict players performance and engage fans.

Through this project, I gained a profound understanding of the importance of aligning business and design decisions. Simple yet thoughtful design choices can significantly enhance both the customer's experience and increase brand touchpoints.

Participating in my first in-depth design sprint taught me the value of quickly generating and testing theories. This iterative process helped challenge preconceived assumptions, leading to more effective solutions for our customers and a more positive experience with Major League Baseball.

Furthermore, this project reshaped my perspective on collaboration. Trust proved to be essential in completing such a large-scale project, with each team member taking on designated tasks. I learned to trust the decisions made and to follow through with them, grateful for the cohesive team that made this experience possible.