Influencing Factors of NBA Player’s Salary Based on Mixed Linear Model

With the intensification of the global commercial influence of NBA, the salary of its player has always been a hot topic. This paper aims to offer a more practical insight for stakeholders within NBA ecosystem and provide a reference for the revolution and development of China’s professional basketball league by further analyzing the main factors that impact the salary level of NBA player based on previous study. Although many of the influencing factors considered in this paper have been mentioned in previous literature, they have not been systematically sorted out and analyzed based on data. A total of 8626 valid datasets of 454 NBA players in 2017-2018 season are selected as the research object for the study. By constructing a mixed linear model, which considers both fixed effects and random effects in NBA player’s salary influencing factors, two conclusions are drawn. Firstly, there are multiple factors that affect the salary of NBA players, among which age, morphology, draft ranking, game experience and usage have obvious influence on the salary of players. On the other hand, nationality, education and efficiency (related to team performance) have no significant correlation with player’s salary.