As an economics major, I’m naturally curious about why sports franchises make the decisions they do, both on an administrative level, like general management and ownership, and the direct level with on-field decision-making. Multiple oft-conflicting incentives run rampant, including owners wanting to save money (see: the Tampa Bay Rays) and coaches wanting the best players to win games at any cost (Los Angeles Dodgers). 

Decisions about what to prioritize oftentimes can be modeled with game theory, a branch of economics that tries to explain what payoffs drive parties involved to act in a certain way. Here is a certain example, which admittedly makes a lot of assumptions about what drives players to give a lot of effort. However, the game assumes that all else being equal, owners prefer to save money over spending it, and players would rather give a low effort level than a high one. The explanation for the second assumption is that players want to stay healthy and don’t have other incentives to play hard.

In the table below, owners can choose whether to pay players or to save money, and the players simultaneously get the option to give 100% effort or to slack and give a lower effort level. 

The first number represents the owner’s level of utility from the outcome, and the second, the players’. It may seem a little confusing at first, but what really matters is that the higher the number, the better the outcome for the party it represents.

In this situation, the owners are incentivized to save money, because their payoffs are higher no matter what effort level the players give. The players, conversely, are incentivized to give a low effort level. See, if the owners choose to spend, the players get a utility level of 3 by giving high effort, but a higher level of 4 by giving less effort. In the same way, if the owners save, the players’ payoffs are 1 for going all-out and 2 for slacking. Either way, they will choose to slack.

That leads us to the ultimate outcome of owners choosing to save money, and players choosing to give low effort. So how do owners get players to try, and how can players get owners to spend to increase both of their utility levels? Incentives in contracts are one of the best ways.

One way is through bonuses, which are all over the place, not just in professional sports, but in all industries. Players want to get paid and owners want their players to give effort to hit certain marks, so contracts are put in place with clauses granting bonuses for those marks. That way, when players try harder, they’re more likely to hit those marks and get paid more. It benefits the owners as well because they know that their extra money will only be spent if the players perform well.

This is just one of many places where game theory can rear its head in sports, and I’m here to discuss a couple of other places I’ve taken note of lately.

NBA Game Theory

A couple months ago, I was watching the NBA’s edition of the Avengers vs. Thanos in Endgame: The Oklahoma City Thunder and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Not that one of those teams is inherently Thanos-level evil, but the point was supposed to be two of the league’s most powerful teams squaring off for the second time, with a different victor. 

During the clash of titans, my mom walks down the stairs, barely even looks at the television, and goes into her common spiel. 

“All they do in the NBA now is shoot threes.”

I thought the comment was a bit misplaced in the scope of that game, as Shai-Gilgeous Alexander was in the midst of putting together a dazzling display of midrange jumpers.

However, zooming out from that particular game, she’s not wrong. NBA teams are once again bombing away this year, shooting an average of over 37 triples a game on average, up from about 35 last year, according to StatMuse. That’s the most of any season ever, which makes this the most three-point-heavy NBA anybody has ever watched. The trend has been rapid and effective. Just ten years ago, during the 2014-2015 season, the league average attempts per game was 22.4, so that average has increased by over 50% during the last decade. Mirroring the trend in triples, scoring has also increased, albeit not by the same margin. In fact, team scoring over the same period is up an average of 13 points per game to 113, which makes for a 13% increase (I hope you like the number 13).

NBA commissioner Adam Silver articulated a slightly different view of this trend back in December.

“I watch as many games as all of you do, and to the extent that it’s not so much a 3-point issue, but that some of the audience, some of the offenses start to look sort of cookie cutter and teams are copying each other,” Silver said. “I think that’s something we should pay attention to.” 

The numbers do suggest the conclusion that offenses have been made more efficient through higher numbers of three-point attempts. When teams can make threes, it opens up the lane for drives and dunks/layups at the rim, which are higher percentage shots. But most basketball fans know this intuitively, so I’m not exactly reinventing the wheel here. 

What really interests me is the intersection between fan experiences, like my mom’s, and strategies teams use to attempt to win the most games possible. 

I’ve heard from many sources that they don’t think this “new style” of NBA action is as fun to watch as it once was, due to the limited number of play styles and the famed death of the midrange jumper. For reference, I think this may be somewhat due to nostalgia and other factors, but let’s just say for this example the true satisfaction of watching today’s NBA is lower than the “game of old.”

The table below will measure the utility levels of two teams who have the choice to play the less effective ‘fun’ style of play, or the more effective ‘boring’ style. The first number will be Team A’s utility, and the second will be Team B’s.

Here’s how this example works: 

• Winning the game rewards a team with 10 points.
• Games where teams play the same style are split 50/50, so each will receive 5 points.
• Games where teams play the more effective “boring” style while the other plays the “fun” style will win every time in this scenario and be rewarded with 10 points.
• When teams play the fun style, they receive one extra point of utility because of the additional revenue the hypothetical extra viewership brings in. 

This example is a classic, known as a prisoner’s dilemma. As you see here, both teams have the incentive to choose the boring style, because they will get more utility points that way, no matter what strategy their opponent chooses. This brings us to what’s known as a Nash Equilibrium, where no party can improve their utility by changing their strategy. In this example, the NE is (boring, boring), which, as you can see, brings a lower utility level than if both teams chose to play the fun strategy. 

In a prisoner’s dilemma, the sum of Nash Equilibrium payoffs is worse than another potential outcome, but both parties are unwilling to switch their strategies because they would be worse off. If Team A switches to the fun style, they go from 5 utility points to 1, and the same for Team B. 

The outcome is also worse for the fans, who now are watching both teams play a self-described boring style of basketball as opposed to a game with a wider variety of shots.

This is where the NBA is at right now. Teams generally choose to prioritize winning over a certain style of play, which right now for most teams seems to be a barrage of deep shots. For fans that just want to see a vastly different style of play, there are a couple teams that prioritize that on the court over winning. They are the Harlem Globetrotters and the Washington Generals, and most NBA fans wouldn’t want the league to turn into that. Or, they can just pick a couple of college teams that play different styles.

Without rule changes such as potentially moving the three-point line back, good luck putting the long-range cat back in the bag. 

Professional Volleyball Game Theory

On January 16, yet another challenger appeared in the women’s pro volleyball scene. Major League Volleyball, with high-profile partners including music star Jason Derulo, former U.S. women’s beach volleyball player Kerri Walsh Jennings and Omaha Supernovas founder Danny White, announced they are creating a new league that intends to be “The top women’s pro sports league in the U.S.”

The league plans to begin play in January 2026 and cites growing interest in the sport collegiately as a reason for the timing in the announcement. 

However, this is far from the first attempt to build a profitable professional volleyball league. Existing examples include the Pro Volleyball Federation, League One Volleyball, and Athletes Unlimited, the latter of which operates a little bit differently by switching teams up and allowing players to recruit different players each week. I almost liken it to recess football, where we used to pick teams from scratch every day after demolishing cafeteria pizza.

With all these league options now fighting for attention, players and viewership, it made me think, “Is this good for any of the organizations?”

Noa Chen, one of KCOU’s resident volleyball experts, expressed a similar sentiment of curiosity surrounding MLV’s announcement.

“My initial reaction is, ‘Why?’” Chen said.

First, let’s address the elephant in the room. While the sport’s popularity is growing, volleyball still does not have a huge fan base compared to other major sports like the NFL or NBA. According to a Gallup poll from December 2023, only 1% of respondents marked it as their favorite sport to watch. Over a year later, that number may be higher, though. Both college and professional volleyball leagues have set records for attendance in the past year, demonstrating the consistent growth in volleyball’s fan base. Women’s sports also surpassed $1 billion in revenue for the first time in 2024, further articulating spurting interest outside of men’s sports.

It seems that the idea in the expanding pro volleyball scene is that leagues are betting on the future of women’s volleyball becoming a much bigger sport, and therefore increasing the size of the pie they can all share. In this next section, I’ll break down the current market in women’s pro volleyball and talk about what MLV is attempting to do. 

It seems as if, at least for now, the three primary existing leagues are at least financially viable in the short term, with PVF playing its second year and LOVB in the middle of its inaugural season. Many of the leagues have received substantial angel investment dollars from a variety of sources, with LOVB raising over $160 million, PVF raising $150 million, and now MLV reporting backing of over $100 million. PVF also just increased salaries for its players in the league’s second year. However, Chen isn’t convinced that all this investment money will lead to all the leagues being profitable long-term.

“I just don’t see it working out the way anybody wants it to. The big marketing push from MLV is, ‘We need one major league in volleyball’”, Chen said. “But you just created another one.”

Assuming Chen is correct, and the sports’ market is unable to support four active leagues, we can hypothesize what the league’s revenues could look like in the form of a game table. I tried to find data on the leagues’ actual revenue numbers but with little success. 

Here, it’s important to remember investment funds are different from revenues, and investors can pull that money out just as they poured it in. Of course, no pro women’s volleyball leagues have ever had these types of investments or interest level, so optimism is certainly warranted.

Remember, this example is in no way reflective of the actual revenue or cost curves those leagues are actually facing, but just a thought experiment guessing what Major League Volleyball’s market could be similar to.

In this market example, it’s interesting that Major League Volleyball would want to enter into this market under these circumstances. Although businesses may choose to start up while facing immediate losses in hopes of future earnings, they usually have good reason to believe that the market will expand or they can take a bigger piece of it. MLV knows this, so what it’s trying to do is tip the scales in its favor, ever so slightly. 

How? Enter American pro volleyball’s most popular franchise, the PVF’s Omaha Supernovas. Conveniently located in the volleyball hotspot that is the state of Nebraska, the team set attendance records in its opening season last year. In MLV’s announcement, one of its primary incentives was stealing the franchise away from the PVF to instantly give the fledgling league some much-needed brand recognition.

“Right now, the Supernovas are the driving force in professional volleyball,” Chen said.

If the MLV can even coax $50,000 in revenues from the other three leagues to add to its own pile, watch what happens to the chart: 

Suddenly, Danny White and Jason Derulo’s new league doesn’t look like such a bad idea after all. The best part about this, in MLV’s eyes, is that if it truly does cause the other three leagues to post losses, they’re incentivized to close up shop. Where does that viewership and revenue go? You can figure that one out. 

That could be how MLV is hoping to affect the professional volleyball market and become the dominant force in the industry moving forward, even if the league’s announcement talks about top-class medical and training support for players and athlete empowerment, among other things.

I’ll certainly be keeping a close eye on how these leagues coexist with one another over the next three years, because we’re in for a period of reckoning in the women’s professional volleyball world.