Inside the NBA Bubble: How Black Players Performed Better without Fans

Mauro Caselli, Paolo Falco, Babak Somekh

Publikation: Working paperForskning

Abstract

In the NBA, predominantly Black players play in front of predominantly non-Black fans. Using the 'NBA bubble', a natural experiment induced by COVID-19, we show that the performance of Black players improved significantly with the absence of fans vis-à-vis White players. This is consistent with Black athletes being negatively affected by racist pressure from mostly non-Black audiences. We dispel several alternative hypotheses. Beyond hurting individual players, fans' behavior causes significant economic damage to the NBA by lowering the quality of the game.
OriginalsprogEngelsk
StatusUdgivet - 2022

Emneord

  • discrimination
  • harassment
  • racism
  • performance
  • basketball
  • NBA
  • COVID-19

Citationsformater