Past performance, present judgment and situational influences: performance evaluation bias in Major League Baseball

Purpose This study examines whether an evaluee's prior performance anchors professional evaluators' assessments of current performance and whether situational conditions alter this performance evaluation bias (PEB). Integrating theory on heuristic and systematic models of information processing, it tests whether evaluator fatigue strengthens anchoring-based PEB and whether different forms of decision stakes weaken it. Design/methodology/approach The study analyzes 1,452,180 ball-and-strike calls made by Major League Baseball umpires during 2015–2018. Computerized pitch-location data provide an objective benchmark for each subjective call. Generalized linear models test whether pitchers' prior-season Wins Above Replacement predicts gifted strikes on objectively out-of-zone pitches and whether inning, run expectancy, strike count and batter All-Star appearances moderate this association. Findings Pitchers with stronger prior-season performance receive more gifted strikes, consistent with anchoring-based PEB. The moderating effects are neither uniform nor always as predicted. PEB decreases rather than increases in later innings, increases with run expectancy, decreases when the batter has one or two strikes and does not vary significantly with batter All-Star status. Situational conditions can therefore attenuate or intensify evaluators' reliance on prior-performance anchors. Originality/value The study positions anchoring as a central cognitive mechanism underlying PEB and extends prior research on status and reputation by demonstrating prior-performance effects among highly trained professional evaluators whose judgments can be compared with an objective benchmark. It also advances a context-sensitive account of PEB by showing that fatigue and decision stakes do not have uniform effects and that distinct forms of stakes can have opposing associations with evaluative bias.