IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jospec/v3y2002i2p204-228.html

The Many Dimensions of Competitive Balance

Author

Listed:
  • Allen R. Sanderson

    (The University of Chicago)

Abstract

Discussions of competitive imbalance use Major League Baseball as a focal point, and proposed remedies center on redistributions of revenues from well-heeled owners to financially strapped franchises. However, there are also many additional aspects in sports that do not involve allocations of economic resources directly but nevertheless affect outcomes and balance among competitors. All leagues and associations have to confront the fundamental issue of relative strengths between adversaries. To create some semblance of balance and ensure the integrity of play, they place constraints on the competitive process and respond to technological changes that threaten to disrupt the current environment, including the use of performance-enhancing inputs. Although we extol the virtues of natural athletes and level playing fields with regard to skill development, ensuring evenly matched contests, and comparing performances over time, there are arguably no consistent, objective standards we can employ. Imbalance is an inherent, intractable part of all competitions.

Suggested Citation

  • Allen R. Sanderson, 2002. "The Many Dimensions of Competitive Balance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 3(2), pages 204-228, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jospec:v:3:y:2002:i:2:p:204-228
    DOI: 10.1177/152700250200300206
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/152700250200300206
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/152700250200300206?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. Lazear, Edward P & Rosen, Sherwin, 1981. "Rank-Order Tournaments as Optimum Labor Contracts," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(5), pages 841-864, October.
    2. Simon Rottenberg, 1956. "The Baseball Players' Labor Market," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 64(3), pages 242-242.
    3. Rosen, Sherwin & Sanderson, Allen, 2001. "Labour Markets in Professional Sports," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(469), pages 47-68, February.
    4. Beck A. Taylor & Justin G. Trogdon, 2002. "Losing to Win: Tournament Incentives in the National Basketball Association," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 23-41, January.
    5. Scully, Gerald W., 1995. "The Market Structure of Sports," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226743950, December.
    6. George Akerlof, 1976. "The Economics of Caste and of the Rat Race and Other Woeful Tales," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 90(4), pages 599-617.
    7. Rosen, Sherwin, 1986. "Prizes and Incentives in Elimination Tournaments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 701-715, September.
    8. Rosen, Sherwin, 1981. "The Economics of Superstars," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(5), pages 845-858, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Rosen, Sherwin & Sanderson, Allen, 2001. "Labour Markets in Professional Sports," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(469), pages 47-68, February.
    2. Wladimir Andreff, 2009. "Équilibre compétitif et contrainte budgétaire dans une ligue de sport professionnel," Revue économique, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 60(3), pages 591-633.
    3. António Sérgio Ribeiro & Francisco Lima & Sascha Kraus & Ferran Calabuig, 2022. "Tournaments within football teams: players’ performance and wages," Economic Research-Ekonomska Istraživanja, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(1), pages 4884-4901, December.
    4. Allen R. Sanderson & John J. Siegfried, 2003. "Thinking about Competitive Balance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 4(4), pages 255-279, November.
    5. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Thieme, Lutz & Falk, Rüdiger, 2021. "Zur Entwicklung von Vergütungssystemen in deutschen Großsportvereinen," Working Papers of the European Institute for Socioeconomics 35, European Institute for Socioeconomics (EIS), Saarbrücken.
    7. Thomas Ericson, 2000. "The Bosman Case," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 1(3), pages 203-218, August.
    8. Martina Gianecchini & Alberto Alvisi, 2015. "Late career of superstar soccer players: win, play, or gain?," "Marco Fanno" Working Papers 0192, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche "Marco Fanno".
    9. Arne Feddersen & Brad Humphreys & Brian Soebbing, 2012. "Cost Incentives in European Football," Working Papers 2012-13, University of Alberta, Department of Economics.
    10. Matthias Kräkel, 2006. "Splitting Leagues," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 88(1), pages 21-48, June.
    11. Alexander Matros, 2006. "Elimination Tournaments where Players Have Fixed Resources," Working Paper 205, Department of Economics, University of Pittsburgh, revised Jan 2006.
    12. Legge, Stefan & Schmid, Lukas, 2013. "Rankings, Random Successes, and Individual Performance," Economics Working Paper Series 1340, University of St. Gallen, School of Economics and Political Science.
    13. Ian Gregory-Smith & Peter W Wright, 2019. "Winners and losers of corporate tournaments," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 71(1), pages 250-268.
    14. Ignacio Palacios-Huerta, 2025. "The Beautiful Dataset," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 63(4), pages 1363-1423, December.
    15. Philippe Cyrenne, 2018. "Salary Inequality, Team Success, League Policies, And The Superstar Effect," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(1), pages 200-214, January.
    16. Tina Heubeck & Jochen Scheuer, "undated". "Incentive Contracts in Team Sports - Theory and Practice," German Working Papers in Law and Economics 2002-1-1042, Berkeley Electronic Press.
    17. Wladimir Andreff, 2011. "Some comparative economics of the organization of sports: Competition and regulation in north American vs. European professional team sports leagues," Post-Print halshs-00677436, HAL.
    18. Matthieu Llorca & Thierry Teste, 2016. "Dépenses salariales et performance dans l’industrie du football," Revue française d'économie, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 0(2), pages 125-145.
    19. Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio & Francesc Pujol, 2007. "Hidden monopsony rents in winner-take-all markets-sport and economic contribution of Spanish soccer players," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(1), pages 57-70.
    20. Anna Bykova & Dennis Coates, 2022. "Professional team sporting success: do economic and personal freedom provide competitive advantages?," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 323-358, December.
    21. Hao Li, 2010. "Sherwin Rosen," Chapters, in: Ross B. Emmett (ed.), The Elgar Companion to the Chicago School of Economics, chapter 14, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    More about this item

    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:3:y:2002:i:2:p:204-228. 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.