Sports teams have to continually change their player rosters in order to be competitive. As the hiring of new players is a high financial investment, team managers need to increase their understanding about newcomer performance. With this purpose, this study is focused on newcomers' performance in the interactive environment of basketball teams. This work tested a multilevel model using longitudinal data from 132 newcomers in 30 National Basketball Association teams. The results of this study may be especially appealing for sports team coaches by showing how newcomers improved their initial performance after they had spent sufficient time playing with other team members. In addition, the results show that how a high prior performance of the current members may make newcomers' adaptation harder, involving a negative effect on the initial performance of the newcomers. These results should be useful for team managers who have to plan the season and make hiring decisions.
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