Who You Gonna Foul? How Players in the NBA Legally Deter Fouls

15 Pages Posted: 11 May 2011

Date Written: May 10, 2011

Abstract

This paper addresses how players in the National Basketball Association can successfully reduce the number of times they are fouled. By committing fouls in basketball, one is essentially committing a crime. These criminals engage in rational economic decision making when choosing whether or not to foul an opponent. In doing so, I argue that they respond to incentives. Players who are better able to prevent a good outcome from fouls (reduced points) are fouled less than players who are less able to do so. This research has broader implications into the world of crime, namely that individual people are able to deter criminal acts committed against them on their own by investing in capital, which reduces the payoff of committing a crime against them.

Keywords: sportometrics, crime, criminal behavior, cost benefit analysis

JEL Classification: C01, D83, L83

Suggested Citation

Hebert, David J., Who You Gonna Foul? How Players in the NBA Legally Deter Fouls (May 10, 2011). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1837713 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1837713

David J. Hebert (Contact Author)

Aquinas College ( email )

Nashville, TN
United States

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