IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jospec/v10y2009i2p168-179.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Postseason Value of an Elite Player to a Contending Team

Author

Listed:
  • Anthony C. Krautmann

    (DePaul University)

  • James Ciecka

    (DePaul University)

Abstract

This paper suggests the possibility that a superstar's ability to propel a team into the playoffs may make him particularly valuable—pushing his salary beyond that which would otherwise be expected. Whereas a team in Major League Baseball (MLB) could play as many as 11 additional home games by the time it concludes the World Series, the number of home-field playoff games is a random variable with a mean of about 4 extra home games. Using reasonable assumptions, this implies that the expected increase in a MLB team's revenues associated with making the playoffs is about $11 million. The analysis shows that contending teams pay elite players (on average) an extra $2.8 million—a 40% bonus—to lure superstars to their rosters.

Suggested Citation

  • Anthony C. Krautmann & James Ciecka, 2009. "The Postseason Value of an Elite Player to a Contending Team," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 10(2), pages 168-179, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jospec:v:10:y:2009:i:2:p:168-179
    DOI: 10.1177/1527002508321457
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1527002508321457
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1527002508321457?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Scully, Gerald W, 1974. "Pay and Performance in Major League Baseball," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 64(6), pages 915-930, December.
    2. John D. Burger & Stephen J. K. Walters, 2008. "The Existence and Persistence of a Winner's Curse: New Evidence from the (Baseball) Field," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 75(1), pages 232-245, July.
    3. Blass, Asher A, 1992. "Does the Baseball Labor Market Contradict the Human Capital Model of Investment?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 74(2), pages 261-268, May.
    4. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    5. Paul M. Sommers & Noel Quinton, 1982. "Pay and Performance in Major League Baseball: The Case of the First Family of Free Agents," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 17(3), pages 426-436.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Anthony C. Krautmann, 2013. "What Is Right With Scully Estimates of a Player’s Marginal Revenue Product," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 14(1), pages 97-105, February.
    2. Wladimir Andreff, 2014. "The Winner's Curse in Sports Economics," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-01243890, HAL.
    3. Wladimir Andreff, 2014. "The Winner's Curse in Sports Economics," Post-Print halshs-01243890, HAL.
    4. Hofmann, Julian & Schnittka, Oliver & Johnen, Marius & Kottemann, Pascal, 2021. "Talent or popularity: What drives market value and brand image for human brands?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 748-758.
    5. Anthony C. Krautmann, 2017. "Risk-Averse Team Owners and Players’ Salaries in Major League Baseball," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 18(1), pages 19-33, January.
    6. Dmitry I. Ignatov & Sergey I. Nikolenko & Taimuraz Abaev & Jonas Poelmans, 2014. "Improving Quality Of Service For Radio Station Hosting: An Online Recommender System Based On Information Fusion," HSE Working papers WP BRP 31/MAN/2014, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    7. Terry, Ryan P. & McGee, Jeffrey E. & Kass, Malcolm J., 2018. "The not-so-free agent: Non-performance factors that contribute to free agent compensation premiums," Sport Management Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 189-201.
    8. Thadeu Gasparetto & Carlos Fernandez-Jardon & Angel Barajas, 2014. "Brand Teams And Distribution Of Wealth In Brazilian State Championships," HSE Working papers WP BRP 30/MAN/2014, National Research University Higher School of Economics.
    9. Rockerbie, Duane W, 2010. "Marginal revenue product and salaries: Moneyball redux," MPRA Paper 21410, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Rockerbie, Duane & Easton, Stephen, 2019. "A Real Options Approach to Multi-Year Contracts in Professional Sports," MPRA Paper 93062, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. David J. Berri & Rob Simmons, 2009. "Race and the Evaluation of Signal Callers in the National Football League," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 10(1), pages 23-43, February.
    2. David J. Berri & Martin B. Schmidt & Stacey L. Brook, 2004. "Stars at the Gate," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 5(1), pages 33-50, February.
    3. David J. Berri & John Charles Bradbury, 2010. "Working in the Land of the Metricians," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 11(1), pages 29-47, February.
    4. John D. Burger & Stephen J. K. Walters, 2003. "Market Size, Pay, and Performance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 4(2), pages 108-125, May.
    5. Torbern Anderson & Sumner J. La Croix, 1989. "Minority Pitchers in Major League Baseball: Is There Discrimination by Fans?," Working Papers 198913, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Department of Economics.
    6. Stacey L. Brook, 2021. "A Comparison of NCAA FBS Head Coaches Salary Determination From New and Modified Contracts," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 22(5), pages 491-513, June.
    7. repec:lan:wpaper:3964 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Kerry L. Papps, 2020. "Sports at the vanguard of labor market policy," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 481-481, October.
    9. John D. Burger & Stephen J. K. Walters, 2008. "The Existence and Persistence of a Winner's Curse: New Evidence from the (Baseball) Field," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 75(1), pages 232-245, July.
    10. Joel Maxcy, 2004. "Motivating long-term employment contracts: risk management in major league baseball," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(2), pages 109-120.
    11. Rachel Scarfe & Carl Singleton & Adesola Sunmoni & Paul Telemo, 2024. "The age‐wage‐productivity puzzle: Evidence from the careers of top earners," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 62(2), pages 584-606, April.
    12. Boucher, Michel, 1985. "Coûts de transaction et faible nombre relatif des Canadiens français dans la LNH," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 61(3), pages 388-393, septembre.
    13. Laura Poppo & Keith Weigelt, 2000. "A Test of the Resource‐Based Model Using Baseball Free Agents," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(4), pages 585-614, December.
    14. Anthony C. Krautmann & Elizabeth Gustafson & Lawrence Hadley, 2003. "A Note on the Structural Stability of Salary Equations," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 4(1), pages 56-63, February.
    15. Courtney Paulson & Lindsey Darvin & David Berri, 2023. "Head Coach Gender and Player Performance in NCAA Softball," Journal of Economics, Race, and Policy, Springer, vol. 6(3), pages 173-186, September.
    16. Daniel Brown & Charles R. Link, 2008. "Population and Bandwagon Effects on Local Team Revenues in Major League Baseball," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 9(5), pages 470-487, October.
    17. repec:lan:wpaper:3679 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Anthony C. Krautmann, 2013. "What Is Right With Scully Estimates of a Player’s Marginal Revenue Product," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 14(1), pages 97-105, February.
    19. John Charles Bradbury, 2013. "What Is Right With Scully Estimates of a Player’s Marginal Revenue Product," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 14(1), pages 87-96, February.
    20. Pelnar, Gregory, 2007. "Antitrust Analysis of Sports Leagues," MPRA Paper 5382, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. David J. Berri & Martin B. Schmidt, 2006. "On the Road With the National Basketball Association's Superstar Externality," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 7(4), pages 347-358, November.
    22. Papps, Kerry L., 2010. "Productivity under Large Pay Increases: Evidence from Professional Baseball," IZA Discussion Papers 5133, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    value; elite player;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jospec:v:10:y:2009:i:2:p:168-179. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.