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Competitive Balance in Sports

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Submitted By jrflyer925
Words 417
Pages 2
Brian Christie
Introduction to Sports Management
Ahn Taesoo
March 4, 2014
Competitive balance: which is the most important measurement? Competitive balance is extremely important for every professional sports league. Without a competitive balance, attendance and television ratings will go down. These things cause losses in revenue which is a huge problem for every professional organization. If the organizations lose too much revenue they will fold; if this happens to often the league will possibly fall. This is just a brief description of why competitive balance is so important to professional sports leagues. Competitive balance is measured three different ways. The first is called “within season variation.” In short, within season variation would be perfect in a given league if every single team had a .500 record. It takes little common sense to figure out that this is not the best way to measure what will make a successful professional sports league. A league with every team being an average .500 would not be very exciting. Another measurement of competitive balance is “between-season variation.” Between-season variation is a measurement of the chance that teams move up and down in the standings from year to year. For example, if the Yankees and Red Sox finish in first and second place in their division every single year, this is not good between-season variation. The more that teams fluctuate in the standings and their winning percentages from year to year, the better the between-season variation is, so competitive balance is better. The last measurement of competitive balance is “frequency of championship winning.” This is simply the frequency in which certain teams win a championship over a period of time. This is a simple concept, yet it is the most effective way to judge the competitive balance in a professional sports league. The reason that this is the best measurement is because it has a great effect on between-season variation as well. Bud Selig said himself that this was the best way to judge the competitive balance of a professional sports league. If a different team is winning the championship every year; the between-season variation is probably very good as well. Frequency of championship winning is the most effective way to judge the competitive balance of a pro sports league. The league wants different teams winning every year because it promotes excitement, raises attendance, and raises TV ratings. All of these things bring in more revenue which is the ultimate goal for the sports teams.

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