Measuring the values of cricket players

Abstract

Sports franchises that participate in team sports can make better decisions regarding their players' financial compensation, renewal of the contracts, bidding strategies during the auction, etc., if they can adequately assess the value or worth of their players. Evaluating the value of a player in a team sport is difficult because various team members play different roles. In this study, we resolve this by measuring the value of a player in terms of how his inclusion in the team affects the team's probability of winning. With this notion of value, we develop a technique to measure the worth of a cricket player for his franchise. To illustrate this technique, we evaluate the values of cricket players who play in the Indian Premier League. We also study the relationship between players' values and their salaries. We find that a few popular players earn disproportionately more than others. This disproportionality in the income of popular players cannot be justified by their performance alone, as adjudged by their values in this work. We attribute the disproportionality in the income to the factors not captured via conventional yardsticks, including leadership or brand value.