Rocket science: How snooker delivers lessons in economics

As the latest finger-in-the-wind forecasts fuel week 94 of the Brexit debate, thoughts naturally turn to Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre and snooker’s World Championship.

There are worse things to do than take a breather from the Euro-shouting match for a close study of the green baize for the next week or so; the only noise you’ll hear disturbing the hush is brief applause as a player rattles in a long pot or traps his opponent with cunning safety play.

That isn’t to say snooker’s not exciting. Any sport boasting troubled genius “Rocket” Ronnie O’Sullivan — the best player to pick up a cue, and in trouble again this week — will always be box office. But did you know the Rocket is also a one-man economics textbook, casting valuable insights on the so-called “dismal science” and human behaviour? Fact.

Ronnie — the big favourite to win his sixth title this year — created a huge stink a few weeks ago when he refused to pot a black to complete the coveted maximum 147 break and win a frame of snooker. His reason? To the outrage of the general public, he didn’t think that the prize on offer — £10,000 — was good enough.

He explained: “I could have done it but I didn’t think the prize was worthy of a 147. So I’ve tried to let it build up until it’s worthy and then go for it. It’s like going into a Mercedes garage and when they say that you can have the car for £3000, you reply, ‘No way, that’s too cheap. I’m not buying it for that’.” The Rocket’s got previous as well, having had to be persuaded to pot a final black for a 147 in 2010.

As it happens, a fellow pro snaffled the maximum a few days later and thwarted the Rocket’s hopes. But as an example of how people respond to incentives — economics, basically — this is a humdinger. O’Sullivan’s action, or inaction, has been pored over by economists such as Chris Dillow, in his Stumbling and Mumbling blog, and the University of Reading’s James Reade, who’s obviously a snooker fan.

Bear in mind that for us mere mortals thrashing around on the green baize, potting a red and a colour in a row is a minor triumph; and also that in 1997, the Rocket landed a huge £165,000 for completing a 147 in five minutes and 20 seconds — one of the best frames of snooker ever played. So Ronnie clearly felt the incentive for completing the perfect game of snooker was too small, and changed his behaviour accordingly for what an economist might term a “non-optimal” outcome.

Dillow argued that if there was no incentive at all, Ronnie might have just gone on to complete the maximum. But the small size of the payout “crowded out” his desire to perform to the best of his ability.

This behaviour can be compared to the famous experiment by economists Uri Gneezy and Aldo Rustichini, who introduced small fines for parents picking up their children from Israeli nurseries. When there were no fines, parents made much more effort to do the socially acceptable thing and collect their children on time because a teacher had to stay late until they arrived. But the number of latecomers actually rose with the introduction of a fine. The title of the economists’ paper said it all: “A fine is a price”. If the price is too low, the outcomes can be perverse.

Reade argues that Ronnie — far from being an arrogant prima donna — was simply being rational: going for the easy pink to guarantee himself £2000 for the highest break instead of taking on a harder black and risking getting nothing. “Rather than criticising Ronnie, we should be applauding his decision not to be recklessly risky for small rewards,” he says.