Data Scientist

<p><em>This role begins as a contract position at an hourly rate of <strong data-path-to-node="0" data-index-in-node="61">$200 USD per hour</strong>, providing a streamlined path toward a permanent, salaried full-time transition. Please note that while the contract phase offers a higher hourly rate in lieu of benefits, the full-time conversion introduces a comprehensive total rewards package, including premium health coverage and retirement programs, alongside a restructured annual salary.</em></p> <p>Next League is seeking a Data Scientist to join the AI Strategy, Training and Transformation team. This role pairs rigorous applied data science with hands-on AI agent prototyping to power how we deliver measurable outcomes for our sports, entertainment, and league clients.</p> <p>The role sits at the intersection of quantitative modeling and applied AI engineering. You will design and ship models that drive revenue, marketing performance, fan engagement, and operational efficiency, while also prototyping AI agents and applied AI tooling that scale our delivery across client accounts. You will collaborate primarily with product, strategy, and engineering counterparts, with occasional embedding on client engagements to lead technical discovery, audit data, and architect modeling solutions. Clients include professional teams, leagues, major sports properties, and national governing bodies.</p> <p>Projects may span:</p> <ul> <li>Predictive and propensity modeling (fan churn, lookalike audiences, conversion likelihood, lifetime value)</li> <li>Marketing performance, attribution, and media mix modeling</li> <li>Pricing, demand forecasting, and inventory optimization for ticketing and hospitality</li> <li>Recommendation and personalization systems for fan-facing experiences</li> <li>AI agent prototypes for sales, service, content, and internal workflows</li> <li>Evaluation frameworks for LLM and agentic systems (accuracy, latency, cost, safety, drift)</li> <li>Custom analytics and insight tooling for Next League consultants and client stakeholders</li> </ul> <h2>Essential Duties and Responsibilities</h2> <p>The following and other duties may be assigned as necessary:</p> <h3>Modeling &amp; Applied Data Science</h3> <ul> <li>Design, build, and deploy machine learning and statistical models that address client business challenges across revenue, marketing, and fan engagement</li> <li>Lead exploratory data analysis, feature engineering, and model selection across structured and unstructured client data</li> <li>Translate ambiguous business problems into well-scoped modeling initiatives with clear success metrics</li> <li>Build evaluation frameworks and monitor model performance, drift, a