Wilson lobs ball into the future

You’ve heard of RoboCop, how about RoboQB?

Just in time for Thursday’ s NFL Draft, Wilson Sporting Goods is releasing details on its new smart football, whose sensors, it claims, will provide information on release time, spin rate, spiral efficiency and speed.

The Wilson Connected Football system will help quarterbacks learn to throw the ball more efficiently, the company said.

Sam Darnold (inset), the standout USC Trojans quarterback who’s expected to go high in the draft, said the high-tech ball helped make him a better passer.

Darnold had developed “an elongated throwing motion on longer passes” — or so NFL tutor Jordan Palmer noticed while working with Darnold last summer.

Wilson had released a version 1.0 smart-football system — geared toward consumers — in 2016. An upgraded system is set for releaselease later this year.

Ye olde pigskin wasn’tsn’t doing it for the 6-foot-4-inch 20-year-old, Palmer said. “He wasn’t gaining any better spin, any more velocity or any better spiral efficiency.”

Darnold, who admitsts his long windup madede him more vulnerable to fumbles, added: “Withh that data, I was able to psychologically tell myself, OK, nothing changes. I was able to home in on keeping my release compact.” Wilson also boasts its system could also help those delivering snaps for punts or field goals. “One thing we focus on is snap-to-target time,” Dan Hare, a Wilson Labs Engineer, told The

UltimatelyUltimately, Hare predicted, Wilson’s football 2.0 will be as instrumental to the pro game as the digital stopwatch is to track. “Before, a runner could look fast,” Hare said. “But with a stopwatch, you can objectively say, ‘Yes, a 40-yard dash in 4.3 seconds is a very good speed.’ ”