Operations — Sportsologist - Christopher Lee

NBA Draft and Effects on Playing Time

I recently came across a study on the NBA and effects on playing time. The study conducted by Berkeley professors Barry Staw and Ha Hoang, analyzed playing time in the 1980’s over a five year span following the NBA draft. Professor Staw analyzed factors including on court performance, trades, injuries and draft position. What did he find?

“…teams granted more playing time to their most highly DRAFTED players and retained them longer, even after controlling for players’ on court performance, injuries, trade status, and positions played.”

Where a player was selected in the draft was a “significant predictor” in minutes played over the entire five year span that was studied. In addition the draft position effect was “above and beyond” any effects on player’s performance, injury, or trade status. Put simply, players were given more minutes based on where they were drafted.

How significant was the effect on minutes played?

Based on a 24 team league (average used in the study) being picked in the second round resulted in 552 fewer minutes in the following year. That is equivalent to sitting on the bench for 47 extra quarters, or almost 12 games!

One might argue that increased playing time makes sense in the season immediately following the draft, but draft order continued to influence playing time up to and including a player’s fifth year in the NBA. Not only did draft order effect playing time, but the higher a player was drafted the less likely he was to be traded and the longer his career lasted.

Pyschological influences

While the study focuses on escalation of commitment and sunk costs, the psychological phenomenon known as irrational escalation is in play as well. Irrational escalation occurs when people justify increased investment, based on prior investment, despite new evidence showing that decision was probably wrong. The NBA study illustrates this principle as players were given more playing time based on their draft order (and contract) even when their performance might not have justified such an action.

So what does this all mean?

We often hear management and coaches talking about playing their best five players, or looking at roster changes objectively, but based on this study that isn’t necessarily the case. Whether we realize it or not, management decisions in sports are subject to psychological pulls just like decisions in our own daily lives. Further research and education on the topic can help sports organizations overcome these type of decisions.

What do you think about draft status impacting playing time? Would you have guessed it influences minutes played even five years later? Does this surprise you?

Filed Under: Operations, Psychology Tagged With: basketball, NBA

MLB Innings Pitched By Height

A couple months ago Adam Foster of Project Prospect sent out a tweet wondering how height impacts success and longevity as a pitcher. Adam is focused on minor league baseball prospects and thus was curious how height impacts a pitchers chances of “making it” and how long they last in the major leagues.

My first instinct was to look at average career innings by height but found the total innings pitched by height to be very interesting.

6’2″ pitchers have combined to throw more innings than pitchers of any other height. I looked at average career innings pitched by height, but didn’t see any staggering data that would dispute the above graph. Since it can be hard to distinguish relativity in the above graph, I also looked at % of total innings pitched by height.

The percentage chart seems to put things in perspective. 92.2% of the innings pitched since 1960 have come from pitchers 6’0″ or above. 92.2%! It is even more interesting when considering that the average male height is 5 foot 9 1/2 inches. 99.3% of total innings pitched have come from pitchers 5’10″ or taller.

What do you think of the results? Why are taller pitchers responsible for more innings in Major League Baseball? Taller pitchers throw with more velocity? Are more physically intimidating on the mound? Let me know what you think in the comments!

Filed Under: Operations Tagged With: baseball, mlb, pitching

Baseball Player Height and Weight By Year

My last two posts have been about the average height and average weight of MLB players. While I will be looking at performance relative to height and weight as well, I wanted to make a quick post to show height and weight over time. Have players gotten taller on average since 1960? Do players weigh more now than in 1960? The answer to both is yes.

Height went from 72.6 to 73.4 which doesn’t seem like a significant change over a 50 year time span. MLB players are not even an inch taller, on average, than they were in 1960.

Average weight went from 188.6 to 196.4 in about 50 years. Baseball players on average weigh about 8 pounds more than they did in 1960.

The graphs look more shocking than they actually are given height didn’t even change an inch, and weight changed only about 8 pounds. What do you think of the graphs? Any conclusions you’d draw? The next series of posts will be regarding performance relative to height and weight.

It is important to note that the height and weight data used only appears in the data once, as opposed to an updated height and weight for each player every season. I hope to talk with Sean Lahman about his database to understand at what point in the career that type of information is corrected. As it stands the trends shown above likely reflect that new players coming in are taller and weighing more, as opposed to an individual player getting taller and heavier over time.

Filed Under: Operations Tagged With: baseball, height, mlb, weight

Baseball Player Weight By Position

Following up on my post from yesterday regarding average height of baseball players, I wanted to look at the average weight. I posed the question through my Twitter account, and heard back with pitcher, catcher, first base, designated hitter, and third base. Again, I looked at all MLB players since 1960 who played at least five games at a position. If a player, such as Maicer Izturis of the Angels played more than 5 games at 2B and 3B, then he would be counted at both positions. Which position has players that weigh the most? First base. Which position has the lightest players in terms of weight in pounds? Shortstop.

The average MLB historically has weighed 192 pounds. The difference between the heaviest players (1B) and lightest players (SS) was a little under 26 pounds which is quite a bit! While average height and weight by position might not show much, there is interesting data to further examine. For example, how has average height and weight changed over the years? How does height or weight effect performance? These are questions I will answer in follow up posts.

Filed Under: Operations Tagged With: baseball, mlb, weight

Baseball Player Height By Position

I was at a spring training game a few days ago and had an interesting conversation with my dad regarding average height of position players. We guessed that middle infielders (shortstop and second basemen) are the shortest players on the field. Being a numbers guy though I wanted to know for sure. I looked at all MLB players since 1960 who played at least 5 games at a position. Thus, if a player played 5 or more games at multiple positions, he was counted at each position. Which position has the tallest players on the field? Pitchers. Which position has the shorts players? 2B.

The average height of MLB players is just over 6’1″. The difference between the tallest players (pitchers) and shortest players (2B) is three inches which relatively seems like quite a bit. With that in mind, I’ll analyze performance based on height in a post tomorrow, in addition to looking at positions by weight. Does the graph show what you expected? What other ways can you look at height within baseball?

Thanks to Sean Lahman’s Baseball1.com database for the information.

Filed Under: Operations Tagged With: baseball, height, mlb

Birth Month Effect On Baseball Performance, Part II

In our first post, we showed the percentage of players in Major League Baseball based on birth month. As I showed, there is a much higher percentage of players born in August, largely due to the Little League Baseball cutoff date of July 31.

In order for players to reach the majors, they had to have been performing at a higher level through various levels of baseball. But once they reach the major league level, is there any correlation between birth month and performance? Let’s take a look.

Batting

batting

Interestingly, the statistics show that, if anything, players born in JULY outperform those born in August. While 2 HR and 5RBI isn’t huge, it still interesting to see that players born in July outperform those born in August.

Pitching

pitching

There is very little difference in pitching statistics relative to birth month. Players born in August pitched more innings, and had a slightly lower ERA, but no extreme differences between people born in July and August.

Conclusion

Wile there was a huge difference in the percentage of players born in July (6.4%) compared to August (12.2%), the difference in performance was fairly small. How could this be?

The theory is that by the time a player reaches the Major League, they are an expert, and thus in aggregate the statistics are very similar. Any other thoughts? There are more players born in August, yet their performance isn’t any better. What other explanations can you think of?

Filed Under: Operations, Psychology Tagged With: baseball, birth month, mlb

Birth Month Effect On Baseball Players, Part I

The birth month phenomena is an interesting occurrence that is applicable throughout society. While Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell implied the same was true for baseball, I wanted to take a closer look. Looking at the birth month of every MLB player that has appeared in a game since 1965, the graph suggests that you’re most likely to become a MLB player if you are born in August.

Among US born players, 12.2% of MLB players have birthdays in August, while only 6.4% have birthdays in July. A discrepancy that big can’t just happen by accident can it? Not likely. The reasoning is that the Little League Baseball cutoff date for 55 years (up until 2006) was July 31.

So what does that mean? A player, for example, born on August 1, 1996 would be playing in the same division as a kid born on July 31, 1997. Given the cutoff date, the kid with a birthday on August 1 is a year older than the kid with a birthday on July 31 yet they are playing in the same division. Thus, the player with the birthday in August likely has an advantage in size, strength and maturity. Thus players with birthdays in August may be more likely to get picked for All Stars and more likely to get advanced practice time to become an even more successful player.

Interestingly, in 2006 Little League changed the cutoff date to April 31, so if you want your kid to have a leg up on the competition, a May birthday will be most beneficial.