3: Variables in Stata

Due Week 3 · Friday, September 11

Author

Prof. Jack Reilly

Published

Fall 2026

Instructions

For this assignment, you must turn in two documents:
1. Your answers (as a PDF), and
2. A plain-text .do file containing the Stata code you used to arrive at your answers.

Please consider the data in the following table. You may also find this data as a .dta file on the course drive: syracusembb2003.dta.

Dataset

Player G MP FG FGA 3P 3PA TRB AST STL BLK TOV PF PTS
Carmelo Anthony 35 1274 277 612 56 166 349 77 55 30 77 77 778
Hakim Warrick 35 1146 197 364 0 1 297 57 49 44 92 94 518
Gerry McNamara 35 1236 146 364 85 238 80 155 77 2 85 69 467
Kueth Duany 35 944 133 303 43 123 128 71 36 17 57 75 386
Billy Edelin 23 533 80 146 0 2 78 58 24 2 53 22 208
Josh Pace 32 469 62 118 0 2 86 60 26 8 37 33 138
Craig Forth 35 618 56 115 0 1 116 30 15 41 39 90 132
Jeremy McNeil 35 657 54 81 0 0 146 8 9 100 36 112 117
Matt Gorman 9 76 8 23 0 1 19 1 3 2 5 14 21
Andrew Kouwe 6 10 3 5 2 2 2 2 0 0 1 2 10
Ronneil Herron 5 9 2 3 0 0 5 0 0 0 1 0 6
Xzavier Gaines 6 21 1 8 0 3 2 1 1 0 2 0 2
Gary Hall 5 6 1 1 0 0 2 2 1 1 0 0 2
Tyrone Albright 7 20 0 2 0 1 2 1 2 0 3 1 0
Josh Brooks 5 6 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0

Variable definitions:

  • G = Games Played
  • MP = Minutes Played
  • FG = Field Goals Made
  • FGA = Field Goals Attempted
  • TP = Three Point Field Goals Made
  • TPA = Three Point Field Goals Attempted
  • TRB = Total Rebounds
  • AST = Assists
  • STL = Steals
  • BLK = Blocks
  • TOV = Turnovers
  • PF = Personal Fouls
  • PTS = Points Scored

Questions

  1. What is the unit of analysis (the cases) in this table?

  2. Identify the level of measurement of each variable.

  3. What is the mean, median, and mode of the “games played” variable in this data?

  4. Do you think the mean, median, or mode is the best estimate of central tendency for games played? Why?

  5. Many analysts like to create a statistic called “Stocks,” which is the sum of steals and blocks by a player. Create this variable as STK. Who had the most stocks on the team?

  6. Calculate each player’s field goal percentage and three point field goal percentage, storing each in new variables FGP and TPP. Who led the team in field goal percentage and three point percentage?

  7. Transform the variable PTS, generating a new variable PPG (average points scored per game played). How many points per game did Carmelo Anthony, Gerry McNamara, Josh Pace, and Jeremy McNeil average? Who led the team in points per game?

  8. Do the same for 3P, TRB, AST, STL, BLK, and TOV. Who led the Orange in each statistical category per game?

  9. Transform PTS again to generate PPM (points per minute played). Who led the Orange in points per minute?

  10. Create a scatterplot with points per minute (PPM) on the Y axis and minutes played (MP) on the X axis. Add a best-fit line. What is the relationship between points per minute and minutes played?

NoteAI Use

AI use is allowed on this and every problem set that is graded check/no check in this class. You should disclose any AI use as a matter of standard professional ethics, but you will not be evaluated on whether or not you used AI.

I encourage you, however, to use AI intelligently: use it like a teaching assistant to help you understand the material, not as a bot to automatically solve the problem set for you. Remember that you will not have access to a chatbot during in-class exams, so the problem sets are your chance to practice.