Evidence of good and bad player momentum between games in basketball
Supporting Agencies
- Fundación Séneca, Science and Technology Agency of the region of Murcia project 19884/GERM/15
Abstract
The existence of streaks in basketball has been studied for teams (team momentum) and players (hot hand/player momentum) using disparate methods and reaching some conflicting results. However, recent empirical research shows these types of streaks are real and not an artifact of perception. In this research, we analyze a form of player streak that has not been considered before player momentum between games. Using a sample of 39 players and 3483 games of the 2016/17 and 2017/18 NBA regular seasons, we studied the distribution of points scored per minute focusing on both tails of this distribution for each player, i.e., extremely high, and extremely low performance within the same season. Results suggest that there is a certain trend reflecting momentum (for both good and bad performances), but this outcome is influenced by the usage percentage. The trend is to jump back to around 60-70% of the distribution of scores after a very good game and to jump forward to around 30-40% of the distribution of scores after a very bad game. Implications for decision-making are discussed at the end.
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