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Just looking for a good game: competitive balance in the Korean Professional Baseball League

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  • Young Hoon Lee
  • Hayley Jang
  • Rodney Fort

Abstract

Rottenberg’s uncertainty of outcome hypothesis is about preferences that can vary across fans and sports. We provide the first evidence of the empirical power of the hypothesis in the Korean Professional Baseball League (KPBL). In a panel data set, team-level aggregation over years shows that fans of this league attend in ways consistent with the hypothesis at the level of game uncertainty and consecutive season uncertainty, but only the first is statistically significant. KPBL fans appear to just be looking for a good game. This is consistent with the nearly complete concentration of post-season participation among a very few teams outside of the major population centre in Seoul and a lack of local team identification among KPBL fans. Our work adds to the diversity of league structures in the competitive balance literature since talent levels in KPBL are the result of parent company advertising choices rather than geographic identification. There are research questions and a policy implication.

Suggested Citation

  • Young Hoon Lee & Hayley Jang & Rodney Fort, 2016. "Just looking for a good game: competitive balance in the Korean Professional Baseball League," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(33), pages 3104-3115, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:applec:v:48:y:2016:i:33:p:3104-3115
    DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2015.1136393
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Michael R. Butler, 1995. "Competitive Balance in Major League Baseball," The American Economist, Sage Publications, vol. 39(2), pages 46-52, October.
    2. Young Hoon Lee, 2006. "The Decline of Attendance in the Korean Professional Baseball League," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 7(2), pages 187-200, May.
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    9. Young Lee & Rodney Fort, 2008. "Attendance and the Uncertainty-of-Outcome Hypothesis in Baseball," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 33(4), pages 281-295, December.
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    12. Rodney Fort & Young Hoon Lee, 2006. "Stationarity and Major League Baseball Attendance Analysis," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 7(4), pages 408-415, November.
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    Cited by:

    1. Dominik Schreyer, 2019. "Football spectator no-show behaviour in the German Bundesliga," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(45), pages 4882-4901, September.
    2. Taeyeon Oh & Seomgyun Lee & Hayley Jang, 2023. "Outcome Uncertainty and ESports Viewership: The Case of Overwatch League," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 24(8), pages 971-992, December.
    3. Hayley Jang & Doyoung Kim & Young Hoon Lee, 2023. "Uncertainty of Outcome Hypothesis: Theoretical Development and Empirical Evaluation," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 62(3), pages 271-291, May.

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