THE SIGNING OF A PROFESSIONAL ATHLETE
Reducing Uncertainty with a Weighted Mean Hemimetric for Φ − Fuzzy Subsets
Julio Rojas-Mora and Jaime Gil-Lafuente
Dpto. de Econom
´
ıa y Organizaci
´
on de Empresas, Universitat de Barcelona
Diagonal 690, 08034, Barcelona, Spain
Keywords:
Fuzzy sets, Distance, Human resources selection.
Abstract:
In this paper we present a tool to help reduce the uncertainty presented in the decision-making process associ-
ated to the selection and hiring of a professional athlete. A weighted mean hemimetric for Φ − fuzzy subsets
with trapezoidal fuzzy numbers (TrFN) as their elements, allows to compare candidates to the “ideal” player
that the technical body of a team believes should be hired.
1 INTRODUCTION
Uncertainty is present in all the decision-making pro-
cesses we face. In human resources selection, there
is a great deal of uncertainty. Employers check refer-
ences and apply a battery of tests to candidates, with
the hope of making an appropriate choice to fill the
vacancy.
In professional sports, the decision-making pro-
cess associated with the hiring of an athlete involves
facing a possible sporting and economic fiasco
1
, due
to strategic factors associated with the selected can-
didate and the magnitud of the contracts signed. A
wrong decision could disrupt a championship and the
future of a team. Therefore, a large number of vari-
ables from the different areas that can determine the
success of an athlete, must be analyzed: technical,
tactical, physical performance, medical, economic,
psychological, social or other. To make things more
complicated, selection criteria can be different be-
tween a coach that needs to fill a particular need, a
general manager or executive who is interested on in-
mediate impact, or an owner who would like to sign
someone who helps boost attendance(Young, 2008).
Win percentage, can be seen as a metric associated
with performance of sports teams(Borghesi, 2008).
In sports with a high production of statistics, the
marginal production associated with the recruitment
of a new team member can be easily studied. The
research line that develops statistical methods for as-
sessing the appropriateness of an athlete signing, has
1
14 english clubs entered administration and were effectively
insolvent”, as reported by (Sloane, 2006).
been deeply analized (Krautmann and Oppenheimer,
2002; Hendricks et al., 2003; Massey and Thaler,
2006). Nonetheless, it is difficult to allocate the pre-
cise fraction that a player contributes to the victory of
a team
2
.
In sports like football
3
, there are very few vari-
ables stochastical in nature. Most of the characteriza-
tion of a player is made through scouting reports, with
assesments that are filled with subjective information.
The theory of fuzzy subsets created by (Zadeh,
1965), is the tool that allows us to mathematically
model the uncertainty and seek solutions to the prob-
lems it presents. One of the issues explored is to de-
termine the best among a group of candidates, when
we are in the presence of uncertainty
4
.
The evaluation of candidates in the presence of
2
Win Shares, an statistical method for baseball found in (James
and Henzler, 2002), assigns 3 shares to each team win. Total win
shares for the team are distributed to the team members by an anal-
ysis of their individual performance, their performance in the con-
text of their home field and their performance relative to that of
their league. In each league, every year is different, but the amount
of games per season is constant over time. This allows to make
comparisons between athletes who played at times when there was
a preponderance of either the offensive or defensive. Also, compar-
isons between players of different field positions are possible.
3
Soccer.
4
As an example of this line of research, we can observe the
work of (Chen and Wang, 2001) and its application to the search
for the perfect home (Chen and Wang, 2007). The work developed
by (Yang et al., 2005) and its application in databases is also very
interesting. Even the International Olympic Committee has used
a method based on the theory of fuzzy subsets for the selection of
the venue of the 1st Summer Youth Olympic Games (IOC Panel of
Experts, 2007).
158
Rojas-Mora J. and Gil-Lafuente J. (2009).
THE SIGNING OF A PROFESSIONAL ATHLETE - Reducing Uncertainty with a Weighted Mean Hemimetric for Φ - Fuzzy Subsets.
In Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems - Artificial Intelligence and Decision Support Systems, pages
158-163
DOI: 10.5220/0001986101580163
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