Pigou at the Plate

John Bradbury and Douglas J. Drinen
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Douglas J. Drinen: Sewanee: The University of the South

Journal of Sports Economics, 2008, vol. 9, issue 2, 211-224

Abstract: Past studies estimating the marginal revenue products of baseball players have assumed individual players' hitting performances to be independent of teammate spillovers. However, the baseball community's widely held belief in “protection†—that a good (bad) player can improve (diminish) the hit probability of the batter who precedes him in the batting order—violates the assumption of the independence of batting outcomes. In this paper, the authors identify two possible hitting externalities in baseball. Using play-by-play data the authors find evidence contrary to the protection hypothesis—the quality of the on-deck hitter negatively impacts the preceding hitter—though the magnitude of the effect is very small.

Keywords: externalites; baseball; marginal revenue product (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jospec:v:9:y:2008:i:2:p:211-224

DOI: 10.1177/1527002507300178

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