Steven Salaga

The Effects of Outcome Uncertainty, Scoring, and Pregame Expectations on Nielsen Ratings for Bowl Championship Series Games

This study utilizes Nielsen ratings to estimate the factors that influence viewership for Bowl Championship Series telecasts. Our modeling demonstrates increased start-of-game ratings for contests of higher absolute quality, but not of anticipated higher relative quality. Little support is generated for the notion of consumer preference for scoring. However, the relationship between outcome uncertainty and television ratings is dynamic as consumers initially prefer more certain games, but ratings increase systematically throughout a contest when the outcome of that contest becomes more uncertain. Preferences also exist for games in which actual outcomes match pregame expectations.

Historical Time Series Perspectives on Competitive Balance in NCAA Division I Basketball

In this article, we extend the literature on competitive balance to National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I men’s basketball. We track historical within-conference balance utilizing measures accounting for game-level uncertainty and consecutive season uncertainty. We find a host of structural changes in competitive balance across the sport that align closely with the GI Bill, racial integration, and the split of the NCAA into three divisions. We also find evidence of short-term improvements in balance following individual conference-level regulation specific to the Ivy League.

Determinants of Secondary Market Sales Prices for National Football League Personal Seat Licenses and Season Ticket Rights

A strong secondary market has emerged where National Football League (NFL) personal seat licenses (PSL) and season ticket rights (STR) are sold electronically. These data allow us to estimate determinants of market prices for long-run access to NFL attendance. The analysis finds that high-quality seating locations are a strong determinant of price. Clear differences exist between PSL and STR markets in regard to both general interest in the live NFL product and the effect of team quality on market price. Furthermore, we find that higher face value ticket prices are associated with lower secondary market PSL and STR sales prices.

Estimating attendance for the Ultimate Fighting Championship: a demand theory approach

Mixed martial arts emerged as a major player in the sports industry during the 2000s, with the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) growing into the sport’s foremost promotion. Critical to the promotion’s management is understanding fan consumption choices. Using economic demand theory, we draw on the spectator motivation and team sports demand literatures to provide an empirical analysis of what drives demand for mixed martial arts events. Our regression models show that economic and scheduling considerations explain the variation in UFC attendance. The popular notion that The Ultimate Fighter reality series served as the impetus for the UFC’s growth is unsupported by time series analysis and numerous independent variables in our model.