Interim information and managerial risk taking in professional basketball

Wen-Jhan Jane ()
Additional contact information
Wen-Jhan Jane: Shih Hsin University

The Japanese Economic Review, 2025, vol. 76, issue 1, No 5, 163-194

Abstract: Abstract This paper examines whether the substitution decisions, under conditions of paper (or realized) losses, stimulate (or moderate) managerial risk taking. Using data on roster changes and field goal attempts (FGAs) in National Basketball Association (NBA) games, I find strong evidence of the significantly causal effects of paper and realized losses (or gains) on the decisions regarding managerial risk taking. While coaches increase their level of risk taking after experiencing the paper losses of lagging behind in the substitution strategy within a game, the effects of realized gains from leading wins, however, offer evidence of higher risk-seeking in the wake of prior wins. Furthermore, the evidence that players lagging behind increase their risk taking in the final stages of the tournament is robust in empirical settings for the shooting decisions. Finally, a coach with longer tenure engages in higher risk taking in substitutions, whereas a team with an older coach of shorter tenure engages in more risk taking in risky 3-point FGAs.

Keywords: House money; Paper losses; National Basketball Association; Risk taking; Tournaments (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D81 L83 Z2 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s42973-023-00140-7 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:jecrev:v:76:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s42973-023-00140-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.springer.com/journal/42973

DOI: 10.1007/s42973-023-00140-7

Access Statistics for this article

The Japanese Economic Review is currently edited by Michihiro Kandori

More articles in The Japanese Economic Review from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().