Heterogeneity In Sports Analysis

Nevertheless, most competitions, not only in sports, are asymmetric, making the research of incentive effects in this area a frequent occurrence. In his analysis, Sunde (2009) specifies two effects of heterogeneity: incentive effects and capability effects. The latter represents the positive relationship between heterogeneity and the number of games won by the favorite, while the incentive effect represents the contamination hypothesis, i.e. a negative effect of heterogeneity on effort. Analyzing male tennis competitions, Sunde confirms the existence of both effects. In his research, he finds the impact of heterogeneity to be less pronounced for favorites compared to underdogs. For underdogs, the capability effect works hand in hand with the

Much of the empirical research in team contests somehow relates to foul play or sabotage. Konrad (2009) states that the possibility of sabotage has an important effect on optimal contest design, because “if there is a favorite, this player will be a prime target of other players’ sabotage.” Most contest designers do not welcome sabotage and aim to reduce incentives for destructive effort as much as possible which makes it a quite large interest in empirical research. Garicano & Palacios-Huerta (2014) show that, for the case of soccer, increasing the prize spread does in fact increase effort. Yet, it increases both, constructive and destructive effort, and the effects neutralize each other with respect to goal scoring. Garicano & Palacios-Huerta find a negative effect on tickets sold and conclude that destructive effort is unwanted by soccer fans. This is not necessarily true for every sport since destructive effort can be seen as “game-intensifying”, and therefore generally wanted by spectators according to Nieken & Stegh (2010). Hockey, especially in the U.S., is a sport that is characterized by fast, harsh play that even leads to a fist fight on occasion. Therefore, they decide to analyze destructive effort through the number of penalties. Against theoretical predictions, but in line with other empirical findings, they could find an incentive effect for favorites. Favorites playing at home are found to reduce effort, while underdogs do not significantly adjust their effort level. Nieken & Stegh also test the effect of the intermediate score on effort provision, but they could only extract mixed results. Similar to Garicano & Palacios-Huerta (2014), Nieken & Stegh find a positive relationship between destructive effort and prize