Changing the NBA 3-Pointer: How Basketball’s Most Notorious Shot Defies Economic Rules and the Impact of Analytics

Imagine this scene during the closing seconds of an NBA playoff game.

ANNOUNCER: Curry has the ball and dribbles down the court.?You can tell he is thinking about his shot choice.?Should he go for the jump shot or will he attempt the long ball?

(clock ticking passed 15 seconds …)?

ANNOUNCER: This could decide it all.?He steps back.?Bang!?He nailed it! Those 2.6 points wins the game!

Wait.?Two-point six points? Yes. In a game that is becoming predictably dull the value of the three-point shot needs to be reevaluated and the answers come from applying economics and sports analytics because the game is paying too much for that long ball shot.

What Was Once Fair

The three-point shot was introduced in 1979 but did not become popular until recently.

Why does a regular basket count as two points and not just one??When James Naismith started the game in 1891 using goals constructed from peach baskets, there were only two ways to score.?Shoot the ball in the basket during gameplay or a special awarded ‘free throw’ when an opposing player has fouled another.??The free throw was considered easier – a shot from 10 feet without anyone interfering with you – so it was given one point, while all other shots were given two.?The idea was to award more points for harder shots and fewer for easier shots.?This makes me wonder if the game would be more interesting if points were awarded based on the difficulty of the shot.

When the longer three-pointer was added to the game in 1979, officials must have thought that it was worthy of more points following the harder-to-shoot-gets-more-points concept.?It is unclear if there was any debate about the scoring.?Should it be four points, or maybe five. Did anyone suggest six for a half-court shot??Probably not, but what they did settle upon was the idea again that a longer shot deserved more points than the standard two points, so they upped it to three.?But was that the right amount?

Sports Analytics Has Answers

In economics the value of something is often driven by its usefulness, what economist call ‘utility’.?Utility basically means that something that provides more benefits should be more valued and rewarded. Likewise in basketball maybe the value (points) should be based on its utility.?And part of what influences that value is the cost of manufacturing (economists stick with me here).?When a high-speed computer can be made less expensively than a competitor it brings the price down.?Likewise in basketball as of late, players are churning out more and more three-point attempts and making them.?They are easier to make than in the past, in part due to a new generation of players that grew up practicing them and getting rewarded for doing so.?

The question is how many points should those long-shots be worth??What is the price that the economics of basketball award compared to the two-point shot? The answer is to look at the shooting percentage for each – the number of successful baskets compared to attempted shots.?Excluding shots taken underneath the basket (layups and dunks) the two-point shot percentage is about 50%. For the three point attempts the percentage is 35%.?Currently the long shot is awarded three points which of course is more than two, but it is actually a lot more.?It is 50% more points for a shot that is only 30% more difficult.?If we follow the rules of economics then the points for a long shot should be 2.6...and I know that sounds ridiculous, so what needs to change?

"...gone from the game are the floaters, the double clutch, the driving dripples and pull up jump shots that stunned audiences"

The game of NBA basketball is on a trend of becoming predictable and boring with more players simply shooting three-point shots while others complete dunks and layups.?There is not much in between.?Sports analytics show these are the most rewarded shots based on their risk and return equations, that is, their shooting percentage and points rewarded.?It only makes economic sense to attempt those shots.?

More so, gone from the game are the floaters, the double clutch, the driving dripples and pull up jump shots that stunned audiences when the likes of Michael Jordan schooled his opponents.?It was entertaining.?There was player vs. player competitiveness.??However today it seems games are more of shooting exhibition.?Perhaps the only way to make it more entertaining is to award the variety of points based on the difficulty of the shot and at least making the three-point shot more challenging by moving that magic three point line just a little further back.?The data will tell you where.

Note: Clearly my opinions are my own

#datascience #sportsanalytics National Basketball Association (NBA)

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