01. 1930 Seungmo Kim, Taeyeon Oh, Damon PS Andrew
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Northumbria Research Link Northumbria Research Link Citation: Kim, Seungmo, Oh, Taeyeon, Andrew, Damon and Zheng, Jinming (2020) Pay dispersion and team performance in the National Basketball Association. International Journal of Applied Sports Sciences, 32 (1). pp. 1-14. ISSN 1598-2939 Published by: Korea Institute of Sport Science URL: https://doi.org/10.24985/ijass.2020.32.1.1 <https://doi.org/10.24985/ijass.2020.32.1.1> This version was downloaded from Northumbria Research Link: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/44343/ Northumbria University has developed Northumbria Research Link (NRL) to enable users to access the University’s research output. Copyright © and moral rights for items on NRL are retained by the individual author(s) and/or other copyright owners. 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ISSN 1598-2939 (Print) https://doi.org/10.24985/ijass.2020.32.1.1© Korea Institute of Sport Science Pay dispersion and team performance in the National Basketball Association Seungmo Kim1, Taeyeon Oh2*, Damon P. S. Andrew3, & Jinming Zheng4 1Associate Professor, Department of Physical Education, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong 2Assistant Professor, Health and Sport Analytics Laboratory, Department of Health, Exercise Science, and Recreation Management, University of Mississippi, Oxford, USA 3Dean and Professor, College of Education, Florida State University, Tallahassee, USA 4Assistant Professor, Department of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK Abstract This study examines the relationship between player pay dispersion and team performance in the National Basketball Association (NBA) in North America. Specifically, the pay dispersion across teammates in each NBA team was analyzed according to four different models based on their playing time and team performance. Salary data for all NBA teams were collected over 23 consecutive seasons from between 1995-96 to 2017-18. Pay dispersion was measured using the Gini coefficient. Key findings are that the effects of the dispersion are positive for the model with all players in their teams, whereas the effects of pay dispersion on team performance are negative for the models with players who have more playing time, which indicates that greater pay dispersion among the most contributing players is associated with lower team performance. Teams should consider how they can more fairly allocate their capped payrolls among the highest contributing players on their teams based on the equity principle of distributive justice. Teams should consider how they prepare and incorporate other reward methods, such as signing bonuses, which may reduce injustice perceptions of underpaid players and eventually enhance team performance. Key words: pay dispersion, team performance, Gini coefficient, NBA 1 National Basketball Association (NBA) according to Introduction different models based on players' contribution to their teams (e.g., playing time). Payrolls for major This article investigates the relationship between professional leagues, such as the NBA, Major League team pay dispersion and team performance in the Baseball (MLB), Premier League, and La Liga, have drastically increased. For example, the salary cap of the Submitted : 21 November 2019 Revised : 14 January 2020 NBA increased from 11.871 million dollars (1990/1991 Accepted : 7 February 2020 season) to 109.140 million dollars (2019/2020 season). Correspondence : [email protected] 2 Seungmo Kim et al. Certain teams such as the New York Yankees in the and owners in sports teams is similar to the relationship MLB and Chelsea in the Premier League possess between employees and employers in normal business considerable economic resources and have invested companies. As an employer, an owner is motivated to significant funds in order to recruit the most talented provide a competitive reward system in order to athletes in their leagues. Those teams with high payrolls stimulate its players’ best performance on the field were expected to perform well in the leagues, and throughout a season. Different from ordinary business empirical studies found a positive correlation between organizations or companies, the salaries of professional the amount of team payroll and team performance athletes heavily depend upon the equity principle, so (Glasnapp, 2004; Hall & Zimbalist, 2002, Tao, Chuang, “members or groups who have contributed the most to & Lin, 2016). However, as highlighted by Glasnapp the organization should receive the greatest distributions (2004), a positive correlation does not necessarily infer and allocations of resources” (Kim, Andrew, Mahony, causality between payroll and team performance. In fact, & Hums, 2008, p. 380). In other words, players’ past Berri and Schmidt (2010) claimed that team pay could or expected contributions with productivity, effort, explain less than 10 percent of the variation of team’s ability, spectator appeal, and revenue generation (Hums win in the NBA and the National Football League & Chelladurai, 1994; Mahony, Hums, & Riemer, 2002; (NFL) in the US. Indeed, this weak payroll-performance Tornblom & Johnson, 1985) toward their teams’ success is easily noticed that many teams with relatively high should receive the greatest reward. Given this context, payrolls in various professional leagues have experienced the current study aims to examine the effects of pay unsuccessful seasons, some even being excluded from dispersion on team performance among professional the playoffs after a regular season. For instance, though basketball teams of the NBA. Particularly, this research the New York Yankees have routinely ranked among is designed to examine whether pay dispersion could the top two baseball teams in payroll over the past 25 potentially have different effects on team performance years, during a four year stretch from 2013-16, the vertically among all players on a team and horizontally team’s performance did not allow for participation in within groups based on players’ playing time. Although postseason play. Nevertheless, given the positive players can contribute their team with their productivity, relationship between payroll and team performance, effort, ability, spectator appeal, and revenue generation professional teams must ensure financial efficiency is in sports, we utilize playing times as a measure of prioritized over misuse of money. contribution in developing four research models. Against this backdrop (Berri & Schmidt, 2010), one method of examining this phenomenon more closely Theoretical Framework would be to explore the relationship between patterns Payroll Dispersion of pay distributions on team performance to uncover successful strategies because teams that send an Pay dispersion refers to “differences in pay levels excessive proportion of their payroll to a handful of between individuals within (i.e., horizontal or lateral players are more likely to be unsuccessful due to a lack dispersion) and across (i.e., vertical dispersion) jobs or of resources to develop a balanced team (Annala & organizational levels” (Shaw, 2014, p. 522). The Winfree, 2011). Salary disparity among athletes on a dispersion allows relatively few levels, jobs, or team is, in essence, derived from the nature of sports. individuals at the top management or special groups to Even though a professional sports organization or team receive a greater portion of money with a wider range is not always analogous to a non-sport organization or of payroll across individuals, whereas a compressed company, the employment relationship between athletes distribution system pays more equally with a narrower Pay dispersion and team performance in the NBA 3 range across jobs or employees within organizations efforts toward their organizations. Hamilton and Macy (Bloom, 1999). (1923) classified the pay systems into “uniform” and In the literature, pay dispersion has been justified and “divergent” distributions and also insisted that reward understood based on various theoretical frames, such for superior individuals should be compensated as motivation theory (Lawler, 1971), equity theory contingently on excess ability, knowledge, skills, (Adams, 1963), the economics standpoint (Bishop, training, or diligence over common labors. Empirical 1987), and tournament theory (Lazear & Rosen, 1981). studies of the positive aspects of differentiated pay According to the theories, pay dispersion with wide distributions also supports