New Delhi, May 31 -- I've never been much of a sports viewer, but headlines have always been my hook. So, while the records Sri Lankan bowler Muttiah Muralitharan set in the 1990s and 2000s meant little to me, I was absorbed by the news reports of the three rounds of biomechanical testing he underwent to prove that his "doosra" wasn't bending the rules. I still have no idea how many wickets he took, but I do remember that the machine took 250 photos per second and provided a 3D rendering of his bowling action. It seemed so cutting-edge, so unprecedented, so automated a way to measure what I'd always thought was a matter of personal skill and achievement. It was among the early demonstrations of data analysis in sports, and I, for one, had...