Gimme that old time Monster

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Went with the wife and friends to see Cowboys and Aliens.  It was an OK popcorn muncher.  But I was disappointed since I had higher expectations of a Jon Favreau film.  Where's the depth of treatment of...THE MONSTER?

So, to console myself, the next day I watched The Thing From Another World (1951).  Back when men were men, women laughed at them all the time, and a monster was really the star of the show.

All the news that's fit to print (and a wacky opinion)

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Talking about wins and losses from the upcoming NFL bargaining settlement, this from Judy Battista at the NYT:


"A new rookie wage system in which even the top picks in the 2011 draft could sign contracts worth about half of what the top pics signed for in 2010, a concession by players."


Wow.  Current players conceding the earnings of rookies yet to enter the league doesn't seem like much of a concession, especially when...(later in the article):


"And in a boon for players, each team will be expected to be required to spend — in cash, not in tricky accounting — a total of 90 percent of the salary cap."


So... rookies get their entering deals cut by half and owner have agreed to spend it all on current players.  For current players, like Eric Cartman always says on South Park, "Pretty sweet."

Observations on San Diego

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Sorry a break in the posts.  I was traveling.  Part of it to the WEAI Meetings where sports economists gather for many reasons--history, academic fellowship, and, well, it was San Diego.

I counted 17 sessions and 68 papers.

Observations:

1. All of the sessions were "sponsored" by the North American Association of Sports Economists (NAASE). 
2. All of the sessions were organized by Dave Berri (Southern Utah University), Brad Humphreys (University of Alberta), and Tony Krautmann (DePaul University).
3. The Gini coefficient on the number of times a colleague's name appears as an author on the 68 papers was 19.5 (Berri, 7; Humphreys 6; one other person with 5, 14 people with 2, and 87 with 1).  This is pretty equal; the Gini on income inequality in the U.S. in 2009 was 46.8 and in the EU in 2005 31.0.
4. The Gini coefficient on the number of times a university name appears for the 68 papers is 35.4 (University of Alberta, 11; Southern Utah, 8; Michigan and Lancaster, 6; 3 others with 4; 5 others with 3; 17 others with 2; and 45 others appear once).  This is pretty unequal; worse than income inequality in the EU but not quite as bad as income inequality in the U.S.
5. I also categorized the papers into 7 groups, Labor/Discrimination/PEDs (23), I-O/Contests/Balance (17), Production (9), Demand/Attendance (8), Policy/Participation (3), Facilities/Development (3), Others (2).  The Gini coefficient on topics indicates decided inequality at 44.1.

On item 1, there are two other associations.  On items 2-4, I leave readers to their own conclusions.  On the last item, while any categorization is subjective, perhaps we need to branch out a bit?

Turning investment in college sports upside down

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Not to pick on a particular purveyor, only to note a clearly stated poor conclusion, I've commented at Kristi Dosh's Business of College Sports.

She shows 22 athletic departments that more than broke even and goes off into the usual, upside down, conclusion that somehow university administrator investment in athletics, unlike anything else they invest in, are made from the perspective of covering overspending by ADs.

Sigh.  So many mis-perceptions, so little time.

Join the fun there, or go ahead and post here.

Expansion versus Relocation

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OK.  So various sources report:


AEG president Tim Leiweke said that Philip Anschutz is prepared to purchase majority interest in a team.  AEG has spoken to the Vikings, Chargers, Rams, Raiders, and Jaguars.  [Some reports include that some of these teams deny it.]


Let's leave aside the interesting question ownership motivation.


We all know that the tradeoff for the current group of team owners that comprise the NFL is in terms of what should be a pretty "monstrous" expansion fee v. what they can extract from allowing an owner to move an existing team (a supermajority must OK the move).


Which will it be Sports Economics Fans?  Expansion or relocation?

While strolling through the lit one day...

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I came upon a piece in the Atlantic Economic Journal by Paul and Weinbach.  It's about minor league hockey demand.

And it cites nothing recent about hockey demand at all.  Like I said in my initial post, Sports Economists appear to have a difficult time acknowledging their heritage.

See (and the cites therein):

Fort and Winfree.  2008.  "Fan Substitution and the 2004-05 NHL Lockout."  JSE, 9, 425-434.

Winfree.  2009.  "Owner Incentives During the 2004-05 NHL Lockout."  Applied Econ, 41, 3275-3285.

All the Hash That's Fit To Re-Hash

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Just saw a post by Kristi Dosh at Forbes Money on paying college athletes.  I guess sports economists will always have a job.

See her blog, too:  The Business of College Sports.

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