"Smart" basketball aims to step up everyone's game
There are smart phones and smart watches, and now there's a smart basketball.
The 94FIFTY Smart Basketball by InfoMotion Sports Technologies, Inc. aims to improve how players shoot and handle the ball.
Even though it looks and feels like a regular basketball, it has sophisticated sensors hidden inside. With all that hidden tech, it adds on costs -- with the final price around $250 dollars.
But all that money could be well spent, as it will soon make you a star player.
"The 94 fifty smart sensor basketball is designed to be a digital coach in the shape of a basketball," Michael Crowley, CEO of InfoMotion Sports Technologies, told CNET's Sumi Das.
The are nine sensors inside the ball, which connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth, is designed to instantaneously measure the forces you put into it, according to Crowley.
The ball charges on a wireless pad and syncs to a smartphone or tablet with four bounces. While the technology is meant to impress, the most jaw-dropping aspect may still be the price.
CNET senior editor Brian Tong took the ball out for practice, but he says don't expect improvement overnight.
"It's not like all of a sudden you're going to be Michael Jordan or Lebron James with this ball, said Tong. "If you have bad form, this ball's not necessarily going to help you, but it will help you get that ball over the rim and into the hoop."