Category: Sports
What happened to football’s concussion crisis?
Here is a very good New York piece by Reeves Wiedeman, here is the excerpt from yours truly:
When I reached out to Tyler Cowen, he said that his prognostication of football’s death had been off in part because he misread people’s concern for their health and the health of others. “COVID changed my mind on this,” he told me in an email. “A lot of people simply will do foolish stuff, such as not vaccinating, even when their lives may be on the line.”
And:
Youth football participation steadily decreased for more than a decade after news about CTE started to break, but it is on the rise again. Roughly a million boys still play high-school football — twice the number that play either basketball or soccer — and it remains possible in much of the country to sign up your 5-year old to be a linebacker. Most surveys of parents find that they understand there are risks but that they also don’t want to keep their kids from playing.
And:
Fans, it seems, have chosen to believe the NFL has largely done what it can. “They addressed the majority of the ethical issues — the stuff that made them look bad — and now suddenly the story is ‘It’s just sad,’” Nowinski said. “What people are missing is that football has gotten more ethical, but it’s not necessarily safer.”
Worth a ponder.
True, false, or uncertain?
Most strategic improvements in sports have been in the direction of increasing variance and living with the (better EV) results:
Baseball: more extra base hits, no more bunting.
Football: more passing game, going for it on 4th.
Golf: driver ball speed increases.
Bball: 3 pointer…
Tennis: bigger serves/groundstrokes.
Snooker: cannoning the pack to extend breaks.
Chess: sub-optimal but niche exploitive lines.
That is from Agustin Lebron. Maybe a lot of the NBA improvements are simply insisting on better defense and fundamentals? And matching player defensive assignments, or five-man rotations, to more closely align with data on historical success?
Bolivian soccer competition
The men’s national soccer team is hoping that hosting World Cup qualifiers at an altitude higher than ever will help it improve in the South American standings.
The Bolivians usually play in the capital La Paz at 3,640 meters (11,940 feet) above sea level, but the South American soccer body CONMEBOL has allowed them to move their games to El Alto, the second largest city in the country at an altitude of 4,150 meters (13,615 feet). That’s as high as nine Empire State Buildings on top of each other.
With one win and five losses, Bolivia is second to last in the standings, and needs a win on Thursday against visiting Venezuela, which is fifth and coming off a quarterfinal run at the Copa America.
New Bolivia coach Oscar Villegas will make his debut after replacing Antonio Carlos Zago, who was fired in July after a winless Copa. Villegas hopes to exploit the higher altitude by picking a squad in which 80% of the players are used to the thinner air, including six from Always Ready club in El Alto, and six more from Bolívar in La Paz…
Venezuela’s home matches are at sea level…
Here is the full article, via Mathan.
My excellent Conversation with Nate Silver
Here is the audio, video, and transcript. Here is the episode summary:
In his second appearance, Nate Silver joins the show to cover the intersections of predictions, politics, and poker with Tyler. They tackle how coin flips solve status quo bias, gambling’s origins in divination, what kinds of betting Nate would ban, why he’s been limited on several of the New York sports betting sites, how game theory changed poker tournaments, whether poker players make for good employees, running and leaving FiveThirtyEight, why funky batting stances have disappeared, AI’s impact on sports analytics, the most underrated NBA statistic, Sam Bankman-Fried’s place in “the River,” the trait effective altruists need to develop, the stupidest risks Tyler and Nate would take, prediction markets, how many monumental political decisions have been done under the influence of drugs, and more.
Here is one excerpt:
COWEN: Why shouldn’t people gamble only in the positive sum game? Take the US stock market — that certainly seems to be one of them — and manufacture all the suspense you want. Learn about the companies, the CEO. Get your thrill that way and don’t do any other gambling. Why isn’t that just better for everyone?
SILVER: Look, I’m not necessarily a fan of gambling for gambling’s sake. Twice a year, I’ll be in casinos and in Las Vegas a lot. Twice a year, I’ll have a friend who is like, “Let’s just go play blackjack for an hour and have a couple of free drinks,” and things like that. But I like to make bets where I think, at least in principle, I have an edge, or at least can fool myself into thinking I have an edge.
Sometimes, with the sports stuff, you probably know deep down you’re roughly break-even or something like that. You’re doing some smart things, like looking at five different sites and finding a line that’s best, which wipes out some but not all of the house edge. But no, I’m not a huge fan of slot machines, certainly. I think they are very gnarly and addictive in various ways.
COWEN: They limit your sports betting, don’t they?
SILVER: Yes, I’ve been limited by six or seven of the nine New York retail sites.
COWEN: What’s the potential edge they think you might have?
SILVER: It’s just that. If you’re betting $2,000 on the Wizards-Hornets game the moment the line comes out on DraftKings, you’re clearly not a recreational bettor. Just the hallmarks of trying to be a winning player, meaning betting lines early because the line’s early and you don’t have price discovery yet. The early lines are often very beatable. Betting on obscure stuff like “Will this player get X number of rebounds?” or things like that. If you have a knack for — if DraftKings has a line at -3.5 and it’s -4 elsewhere, then it can be called steam chasing, where you bet before a line moves in other places. If you have injury information . . .
It’s a very weird game. One thing I hope people are more aware of is that a lot of the sites — and some are better than others — but they really don’t want winning players. Their advertising has actually changed. It used to be, they would say for Daily Fantasy Sports, which was the predecessor, “Hey, you’re a smart guy” — the ads are very cynical — “You’re a smart guy in a cubicle. Why don’t you go do all your spreadsheet stuff and actually draft this team and make a lot of money, and literally, you’ll be sleeping with supermodels in two months. You win the million-dollar prize from DraftKings.”
And:
COWEN: If we could enforce just an outright ban, what’s the cost-benefit analysis on banning all sports gambling?
SILVER: I’m more of a libertarian than a strict utilitarian, I think.
COWEN: Sure, but what’s the utilitarian price of being a libertarian?
Recommended, interesting and engaging throughout. And yes, we talk about Luka too. Here is my first 2016 CWT with Nate, full of predictions I might add, and here is Nate’s very good new book On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything.
Go for the Gold!
Bob Lawson and I have an op-ed in Barrons with a new perspective on inequality. Kamala Harris has said inequality is “the defining economic challenge of our time.” Indeed, the Gini coefficient for the United States is 0.4, one of the highest among developed nations, and Senator Bernie Sanders says US inequality is “obscene.” But consider another economy:
In this economy, the Gini coefficient is a whopping 0.60—much higher than in the United States or just about any country in the world. Living in this economy must be miserable, right? Well, what if we told you that the average wage in this economy was around $3 million, the median wage close to $1 million, and the poorest 1% earned nearly $800,000 a year?
The economy we are talking about is the NFL. Is comparing inequality within countries to inequality within a sports league an unfair or irrelevant comparison? We don’t think so. NFL inequality can teach us a lot about what inequality statistics mean.
First, inequality does not mean poverty. The average income in the NFL is well above the U.S. average income. Even the poorest 1% do well. Is that a special case? Not at all. The average income in the United States is well above the world average income. And while our poorest 1% don’t have it easy, their situation looks far better when compared to most people in the developing world.
Second, unequal does not mean unjust. Salaries in the NFL are set by competitive market forces. Jared Goff (Detroit Lions) at the top of the NFL roster earns a lot more than Cameron Sutton (Pittsburgh Steelers), who earns the veteran minimum. But Goff didn’t steal his position from Sutton. Nor do Goff’s riches come from Sutton’s penury. Goff doesn’t earn more because Sutton earns less. Goff earns more because he produces more.
[Some people warn that inequality leads to envy, resentment, societal dysfunction and even collapse. But] Steph Curry’s salary dwarfs those of most of his teammates on the Golden State Warriors. Yet, do we see resentment manifesting on the court? Do Steph Curry’s lesser-paid colleagues refuse to pass him the ball or secretly hope for his downfall? On the contrary, Curry’s teammates rally around him. They recognize that his success elevates their chances of winning championships, enhances their visibility, and potentially increases their own market value.
The dynamics throughout our entire society are certainly more complex, but the sports analogy illustrates a crucial point: When inequality is perceived as a result of merit, effort, and value creation—rather than exploitation or unfair advantage—it fosters collaboration instead of resentment.
In such an environment, people see high earners as role models and partners in success, not adversaries. In the same way, if inequality in the United States is seen as a result of merit, effort and value creation it can help the U.S. team cooperate against rivals in the rest of the world. Go Curry! Go Team USA!
[Sports inequality helps us to understand inequality more generally.] The goal shouldn’t be to eliminate inequality, but to ensure it reflects real value creation in a system with ample opportunity and dignity for all. That is best achieved through competitive markets. Do that, and inequality transforms from a divisive force into a driver of progress.
In short: Don’t fear inequality. Fear unfairness. Build a just system, and let the scoreboard reflect the game.
That was then, this is now, German edition
Via Scott Sumner.
What do different countries pay for Olympic gold medals?
Via Cremieux, and here is the related Wikipedia page.
The Financial Consequences of Legalized Sports Gambling
Following a 2018 ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court, 38 states have legalized sports gambling. We study how this policy has impacted consumer financial health using the state-by-state rollout of legal sports gambling and a large and comprehensive dataset on consumer financial outcomes. Our main finding is that overall, consumers’ financial health is modestly deteriorating as the average credit score in states that legalize sports gambling decreases by roughly 0.3%. The decline in credit score is associated with changes in indicators of excessive debt. We find a substantial increase in bankruptcy rates, debt collections, debt consolidation loans, and auto loan delinquencies. We also find that financial institutions respond to the reduced creditworthiness of consumers by restricting access to credit. These results are stronger for states that allow sports gambling online compared to states that restrict access to in-person betting and larger for young men in low-income counties. Together, these results indicate that the ease of access to sports gambling is harming consumer financial health by increasing their level of debt.
That is from a new paper by Brett Hollenbeck, Poet Larsen, and Davide Proserpio.
France faces glut of unwanted Olympics tickets
The number of unwanted Paris Olympics tickets available for resale has hit more than a quarter of a million, as lack of demand increases concerns just days before Friday’s opening ceremony that many athletes will compete against a backdrop of empty seats.
The number of listings rose to 270,465 on Monday, up from about 180,000 a month ago, a Financial Times analysis of the official resale site shows. The most expensive offers on the resale site are for the opening ceremony, with the best seats priced at €2,970.
Note:
Tickets must be resold at face value.
Ahem. Here is the full FT story.
How to feed the Olympics, a problem in procurement
It’s a daunting task to feed 15,000 people no matter what, but if food is fuel, the chefs feeding the athletes at Olympic Village are somewhat responsible for how these athletes perform. Events management and catering group Sodexo Live takes that responsibility seriously. What results is an incredible feat of logistics, combining sustainable sourcing, diversity of options, and ensuring all athlete’s nutritional needs are met by some combination of the 500 dishes that will be served.
But it’s not just baseline nutritional needs that need to be met — athletes are coming from all over the world, with their own culinary traditions. The Olympics are supposed to be a place of cultural exchange, and this extends to the food. Sodexo Live has brought on partner chefs Amandine Chaignot, Akrame Benallal, and Alexandra Mazzia to serve dishes like quinoa muesli, chickpea pommade, and gnocchi in chicken sauce to showcase modern French cuisine. Other chefs on the team are charged with creating everything athletes will need to eat, both before and after the competition.
And:
One of the funny parts that we’ve learned is that we think they’re all athletes and in their physical prime, so distance doesn’t matter. But actually it does, because our dining hall is extremely large, it’s over 220 meters long and 24 meters wide. Walking from one side to the other takes five minutes. And these competitors, they’re not going to go that far, they’re going to really ensure the minimum steps so they don’t spend too much energy. Nobody expected that.
And:
Bananas are an athlete’s favorite thing. We anticipate getting two or three million bananas. At peak time there will be 15,000 people living in one place. So that means per day, at peak time, we’re going to go up to 40,000 meals. At the end of the entire journey, it’s over 1.2 million meals. I was working on quantifying the volume of coffee, how to produce it. And then someone said, “Can we get the coffee grinds back to us to use as a fertilizer?” So what’s the volume of grinds we’ll produce? I’’s 20 tons of coffee, so that means it’ll be 40 tons of coffee residue. But all of this is going to be used to grow mushrooms.
Finally:
Americans have been extremely vocal about what they want. They were more picky and sensitive about having a lot of gluten-free items, and a more vegetable-based diet.
The piece and interview is by Jaya Saxena, the reproduced answers are from Estelle Lamont. Here is the entire piece, via the ever-excellent The Browser.
My excellent Conversation with Brian Winter
Here is the video, audio, and transcript. Here is the episode summary:
It’s not just the churrasco that made him fall in love with Brazil. Brian Winter has been studying and writing about Latin America for over 20 years. He’s been tracking the struggles and triumphs of the region as it’s dealt with decades of coups, violence, and shifting economics. His work offers a nuanced perspective on Latin America’s persistent challenges and remarkable resilience.
Together Brian and Tyler discuss the politics and economics of nearly every country from the equator down. They cover the future of migration into Brazil, what it’s doing right in agriculture, the cultural shift in race politics, crime in Rio and São Paulo, the effectiveness and future consequences of Bukele’s police state in El Salvador, the economic growth of Colombia despite continued violence, the prevalence of startups and psychoanalysis in Argentina, Uruguay’s reduction in poverty levels, the beautiful ugliness of Sao Paulo, where Brian will explore next, and more.
And here is one excerpt;
COWEN: What’s the economic geography of Brazil going to look like? All the wealth near Mato Grosso and the north just very, very poor? Or the north empties out? How’s that going to work? There used to be some modest degree of balance.
WINTER: That’s true. Most of the population in Brazil and the economic center, for sure, was in the southeast. That means, really, São Paulo state, which is about a quarter of Brazil’s population but roughly a third of its GDP. Rio as well, and the state of Minas Gerais, which has a name that tells its history. That means “general mines” in Portuguese. That’s the area where a lot of the gold came out of in the 18th and 19th centuries. That’s gone now, so it’s not as much of an economic pull.
You’re right, Tyler, though, that a lot of the real boom right now, the action, is in places like Mato Grosso, which is in the region of Brazil called the Central West. That’s soy country. I’m from Texas, and Mato Grosso is virtually indistinguishable from Texas these days. It’s hot. It’s flat. The crop, like I said, is soy. There’s cattle ranching as well.
Even the music — Brazil, as others have noted, has gone from being the country of bossa nova and the samba in the 1970s to being the country of sertanejo today. Sertanejo is a Brazilian cousin of country music with accordions, but it’s sung by people — men mostly — in jeans, big belt buckles, and cowboy hats. They’re importing that — not only that economic model but that lifestyle as well.
COWEN: What is the great Brazilian music of today? MPB is dead, right? So, what should someone listen to?
Recommended, interesting throughout.
France, and the United States
The U.S. Olympic team is one of a handful that will supply air conditioners for their athletes at the Paris Games in a move that undercuts organizers’ plans to cut carbon emissions.
U.S. Olympic and Paralympic CEO Sarah Hirshland said Friday that while the U.S. team appreciates efforts aimed at sustainability, the federation would be supplying AC units for what is typically the largest contingent of athletes at the Summer Games.
Here is the full story, via several loyal MR readers.
The best business books aren’t in the management section
I expand on this theme in my latest Bloomberg column, here is one excerpt from that:
I thus have a modest proposal for anyone interested in business books: Read books about specific businesses or industries that you already know a lot about. That way, you will have enough contextual knowledge for the book to be meaningful. Of course many people don’t work at a company or industry big or famous enough that there are books about it, so I have a corollary proposition: You will learn the most about management by reading books about sports and musical groups.
And this:
Many music and sports books are not only written for obsessed fans, but also written by obsessed fans. Traditional business books, in contrast, are frequently written to get consulting work or on to the speaker’s circuit. The incentive is not to offend anybody and to put forward some “least common denominator” insights, rather than say anything truly original that might be complicated to explain. The end result is a bookstore section that would be mind-numbing to have to read.
There is much more of interest at the link, recommended.
What to think of Luka?
I am receiving inquiries as to whether I have upgraded my view of Luka, as his last series against Minnesota was masterful, above say the Larry Bird level.
For a while I have thought he has the potential to become a generational, “best in the NBA” (or second best?) quality player. But he has not been, either. Let us hope the regime has shifted.
But do keep in mind, eleven days ago ESPN ran an article ranking him as the 5th best player in the playoffs through the first two rounds. At the time no one took umbrage at that accurate assessment. Of course that is still very, very good, but not the Luka we have seen as of late. So we’ll see which Luka we get moving forward. Top players do make major upgrades in their games as they move forward, but we also need to tone down the recency bias here. Pre-playoffs he was rated at #2, implying that his performance for the first two rounds was a bit of a disappointment.
In the playoffs more generally:
…Doncic’s production (28.3 points and 9.1 assists per game) and efficiency (49.7% effective field goal percentage) has dipped significantly from his historic regular-season numbers (league-high 33.9 points, 9.8 assists, 57.3% effective field goal percentage).
Of course part of that is exactly the good news as well. Luka reduced his usage rate from 40.3% in the playoffs two years ago (he missed the playoffs last year) to 32.1% this year, a too-high usage rate having been his biggest shortcoming. And the other Mavericks truly have stepped up to fill the gap. Remember when ESPN marked the Kyrie Irving trade a “D”?
By the way, no need to use injuries as an “excuse” — they are common amongst high-usage players, and they count as “quality” every bit as much as healthy performance on the court.
That was then, this is now, NBA edition
Then, from summer of 2023: “The Boston Celtics just set an NBA record by agreeing to a five-year, $304 million contract with two-time All-Star Jaylen Brown…the odds are the deal will be seen as a good one — maybe even a bargain. The economics of the National Basketball Association have been shifting toward more and more money.”
That was by me, for Bloomberg, and at the time that claim received a lot of pushback.
Now: “With a potential $7B annual media rights deal looming, NBA players could make up to $95M a year on supermax contracts in the future.”
Here is a further look at those numbers. Did I mention that the Celtics are in the Eastern Finals and are the current favorite to win the title?