PUBLICATIONS - ARTICLES

Name That Price: Determining Which Price Variable to Use in Estimating Demand for Major League Baseball Games, 1952-56

Authors: David G. Surdam and Kenneth H. Brown
Publication: Journal of Economics
Publication Date: 2009

Estimating demand for events that have multiple ticket prices, such as sporting, musical, and theater performances requires choosing the relevant price variable. Previous attempts may have suffered from errors in variables and from using ordinary least squares instead of panel data techniques. We estimate the price elasticity of demand for 1950s Major League Baseball games by using both a weighted-average ticket price series and an averagegate- revenue per ticket series in separate equations; Read more »

Searching for On-Field Parity:
Evidence from National Football League Scheduling During 1991-2006

Authors: David G. Surdam and Bulent Uyar
Publication: Journal of Sports Economics
Publication Date: 2013

The authors analyze whether the scheduling changes the National Football League (NFL) made at the time to promote parity had the desired impact on the 1995-1998 and the 2003-2006 seasons compared to the 1991-1994 and the 1999-2002 seasons. Using the relative standard deviation (RSD), the authors find that the scheduling changes did not significantly influence parity. Read more »

An Inquiry into the Pay Structure of the New York Yankees: 1919-1941

Authors: David G. Surdam and Kenneth H. Brown
Publication: Eastern Economic Journal
Publication Date: 2009

This paper explores salaries for New York Yankees players during the early 20th century. Thanks to the recent availability of a unique data set, we are able to construct detailed earnings profiles using individual player salaries. Human capital wage estimates suggest that the Yankees’ owners rewarded players on the basis of their contributions to team productivity. Read more »

A Sports Franchise Simulation Game

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Journal of Economic Education
Publication Date: 2009
Link to Article

Students in sports economics courses might better learn the basic concepts by running their own franchise. A simple game, based on the card game War, is easy and inexpensive to implement. Students quickly grasp the importance of weighing marginal benefits, both in terms of team record and marginal revenue, against the costs of improving their team. Read more »

What Brings Fans to the Ball Park? Evidence from New York Yankees’ and Philadelphia Phillies’ Financial Records

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Journal of Economics
Publication Date: 2009

The New York Yankees’ and Philadelphia Phillies’ financial records provide gate receipts for several seasons. From this data, I estimate non-price determinants of demand for individual games. The day of the week, quality of the opposition, and special events were the key determinants of demand. Fans in the 1930s preferred absolute to relative quality in the visiting team. Read more »

The New York Yankees Cope with the Great Depression

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Enterprise and Society
Publication Date: 2008
Link to Article

The New York Yankees donated their financial records to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. These records provide a rare glimpse into the business of professional team sports. I use these records to examine how the Yankees’ management reacted to the Great Depression. Since the team possessed both price-setting power over ticket prices and monopsony power over player salaries, Read more »

A Tale of Two Gate-Sharing Plans:
The National Football League and the National League, 1952-56

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Southern Economic Journal
Publication Date: 2007
Link to Article

Do professional sports leagues design revenue-sharing rules primarily to help financially weaker teams, or do such organizations view revenue-sharing rules as ways to reward teams for being competitive? Baseball’s National League and the National Football League provide evidence from the 1950s that revenue-sharing plans may have surprising effects. If strong teams draw well on the road, Read more »

The Coase Theorem and Player Movement in Major League Baseball

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Journal of Sports Economics
Publication Date: 2006

The Coase theorem suggests that under certain conditions, the distribution of player talent should be similar before and after free agency. Previous attempts to test the theory’s applicability to major league baseball were either examinations of win-loss distributions or comparisons of player movements before and after free agency. These approaches have significant drawbacks. Did the same teams sport winning records over an extended period before and after free agency? Read more »

Television and Minor League Baseball:
Changing Patterns of Leisure in Postwar America

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Journal of Sports Economics
Publication Date: 2005
Link to Article

Minor league baseball flourished in the aftermath of World War II. However, a new technology, television, threatened to broadcast major league games across America. The minor leagues contracted by over a third between 1949 and 1953. Was television the culprit as baseball historians suggest? The diffusion of television does not perfectly match the contraction of the minor leagues. Read more »

American “Not-So-Socialist” League in the Postwar Era:
The Limitations of Gate-Sharing in Reducing Revenue Disparity in Baseball

Author: David G. Surdam
Publication: Journal of Sports Economics
Publication Date: 2002

A suggested remedy for competitive imbalance in professional sports leagues is for home teams to share gate and broadcasting revenues. In some models, researchers assume that as a team becomes stronger, its ability to draw on the road falls (because the rival team is, ceteris paribus, weaker). The experience in the American League during the 1950s demonstrates that this assumption does not hold at all times for all leagues. Read more »