Abstract
In the National Basketball Association (NBA), when an attacking team is trailing by a small margin in the last seconds of
 a game, the coach has to make a critical decision: should he or she design a play for the star player or a non-star player's
 In this strategic situation, the o ensive team can choose to let either the star or the non-star to shoot the ball while the
 defensive team can either double-team the star player or play conventional one-on-one defence. For the purpose of this
 research, star players are divided into two types - perimeter and interior. Given di erent point deficits, an equilibrium
 point is obtained and comparative statics are computed to analyze how the equilibrium will change given a change in a
 player's shot percentage. It is found that the o ensive team should play the star player at most 3 out of 10 times in all
 scenarios.
Highlights
In the waning seconds of Game 6 of the 1993 National Basketball Association (NBA) Finals, the defending champion Chicago Bulls faced a crucial situation where they were trailing by 2 points with 14.4 seconds left
In the National Basketball Association (NBA), when an attacking team is trailing by a small margin in the last seconds of a game, the coach has to make a critical decision: should he or she design a play for the star player or a non-star player? In this strategic situation, the offensive team can choose to let either the star or the non-star to shoot the ball while the defensive team can either double-team the star player or play conventional one-on-one defence
To model this strategic situation, players are divided into star and non-star, and several assumptions are made about the two types of players
Summary
In the waning seconds of Game 6 of the 1993 NBA Finals, the defending champion Chicago Bulls faced a crucial situation where they were trailing by 2 points with 14.4 seconds left. During the final time out, Michael Jordan, aware that he may be double-teamed in the following possession, told his teammate John Paxson to prepare for a 3-point shot. Jordan successfully predicted the double-team and passed the ball to Paxson on time, who hit the game-winning shot and helped the franchise secure its first three-peat. The 2019 NBA champion Toronto Raptors took home around $3.6 million from the $22 million “player’s pool” that is divided among all playoff teams (Carter, 2019). Sound decision-making is crucial in the competitive NBA, which makes it an ideal environment to apply and test game theory principles
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