Book reviewed: Stumbling on wins: two economists expose the pitfalls on the road to victory in professional sports. Upper Saddle River, NJ : FT Press, 2010, 256 pages. Authors: David J. Berri and Martin B. SchmidtBooks - Reviews

Jessica Romero

English

Research Papers in Economics

Region Focus | Fourth Quarter | 2010  31
I
n Stumbling on Wins, David J. Berri and Martin B. Schmidt,
economists at Southern Utah University and the College
of William and Mary, respectively, examine why
“experts” in sports so often make decisions that lose both
money and games. Drawing on behavioral economics, which
suggests that the rational decisionmaker of standard eco-
nomic theory represents an incomplete depiction of 
actual human behavior, Berri and Schmidt argue that we
often are reluctant to accept information that contradicts
our current world view, even if it means repeating the same
mistake again and again. And we often misinterpret the infor-
mation we do have, or overestimate its predictive power.
The solution, they maintain, is “useful” numbers — 
numbers that are actually connected to outcomes (wins) and
numbers that are consistent over time (for instance, 
numbers that will tell you something about a player’s 
performance from year to year). In their 2007 book Wages of
Wins, written with Stacey L. Brook, now at the University of
Iowa, Berri and Schmidt developed a metric called “Wins
Produced” (WP) to evaluate basketball players. WP uses
regression analysis to measure the effect of individual player
box score statistics on team wins. The authors find that a
player’s contribution to wins depends primarily on shooting
efficiency, rebounds, turnovers, and steals. In Stumbling on
Wins, the authors extend the WP framework to analyze
fourth-down play calling in football (coaches play it safe too
often); the value of hockey goalies (less than the goalies
would like to believe); and whether coaching matters in bas-
ketball (not much, apparently, unless the coach is Phil
Jackson), among other things. 
The factors that make a player valuable to his team
should, in general, be the factors that determine his salary.
Berri and Schmidt find that the most important determi-
nant of pay in the National Basketball Association (NBA) is
points scored: Five more points per game equals an extra
$1.4 million per year. The problem is that a player can score
more points simply by taking a lot more shots, and ignoring
other aspects of his game — to the detriment of the team as
a whole. 
Case in point: the New York Knicks of the mid-2000s.
New general manager Isiah Thomas spent millions acquiring
a roster of high-scoring free agents. But despite having the
biggest payrolls in the league, the Thomas-era teams also had
some of the worst records. In a chapter of the book that may
surprise many sports fans who have vilified Thomas, Berri
and Schmidt conclude that he simply showed the same pref-
erence for high scorers as the rest of the league — but had
more money to spend on them. “It’s not clear that other gen-
eral managers would have made different choices given the
budget Isiah had at his disposal,” Berri and Schmidt write.
Berri and Schmidt also examine a long-debated question:
Are black quarterbacks in the National Football League
(NFL) underpaid? Comparing quarterbacks using “Wins
Produced per 100 Plays” (WP100) instead of the NFL ’s
Quarterback Rating — which they deem “complicated, and
furthermore, incomplete and inaccurate” — the authors find
persistent bias in the evaluation of black quarterbacks. On
average, black quarterbacks produce more wins than white
quarterbacks; they are also much more likely to run with the
ball than to throw it, and therein lies the rub. Regressing
salary on various performance measures, Berri and Schmidt
find that the number of passing yards has the most explana-
tory power for salary, while rushing yards are not significant.
Because white quarterbacks on average are paid more than
black quarterbacks, the authors conclude that the black
players are “doing something extra that helps 
their respective teams win games, but this extra effort is
uncompensated.”
Decisionmakers also have difficulty evaluating the 
performance of future players (as fans of the Portland Trail
Blazers, the team that picked Sam Bowie ahead of Michael
Jordan, know all too well). Draft day decisions illustrate a
key aspect of decisionmaking. More data make us feel like
we’re making better, more informed decisions — but the
human brain can process only so much information, a 
concept economists call “bounded rationality.” So we some-
times don’t focus on the most useful information.
In both the NFL and the NBA, Berri and Schmidt 
find that a player’s productivity (as measured by Wins
Produced) doesn’t have much to do with his draft position.
Quarterbacks get picked one round earlier if they’re an inch
taller or score higher on an IQ test. Acollege basketball play-
er who plays in the Final Four of the NCAAtournament can
improve his draft position by a full 12 spots — if he declares
for the draft that same year. If he returns to school, 
the effect on his draft position (and, thus, potentially 
millions of dollars) is lost the following season. Although 
BOOKREVIEW
STUMBLING ON WINS: TWO
ECONOMISTS EXPOSE THE PITFALLS
ON THE ROAD TO VICTORY IN
PROFESSIONAL SPORTS
UPPER SADDLE RIVER, N.J.: FT PRESS,
2010, 256 PAGES
BY DAVID J. BERRI AND 
MARTIN B. SCHMIDT
Calling the Shots
REVIEWED BY JESSIE ROMERO
continued on page 34

Book review : Calling the shots

http://www.richmondfed.org/publications/research/region_focus/2010/q4/pdf/book_review.pdf

Book review : Calling the shots

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