MLB projecting decline in attendance
ByIn a bad economy, superfluous expenditures — such as baseball tickets — often suffer. As the U.S. economy tries to right its floundering ship, baseball officials are predicting a six percent decline in attendance for the upcoming 2009 season. Officials see a lot of enthusiasm surrounding the game, and WBC ticket sales shattered the 2006 numbers. Baseball’s leaders are also counting on new stadiums from the Mets and Yankees to stave off a steeper decline. There is, of course, a rub.
Last year at Shea Stadium, the Mets averaged just over 51,000 fans a game. This year, they’re playing in CitiField, a ballpark with a capacity of just 42,000. Even if they sell out every game — and early indications are that they will not — the Mets alone will be responsible for a one percent dip in baseball attendance. Who decided that building such a small stadium in New York City was a good idea anyway?
49 Comments»
RAB Info
The Founders
Mike Axisa, Ben Kabak, Joe Pawlikowski
Editor-In-Chief
Mike Axisa Archives | Email
Managing Editors
Ben Kabak Archives | E-mail
Joe Pawlikowski Archives | E-mail
Contributing Editors
Larry Koestler (Archives)
Moshe Mandel (Archives)
Stephen Rhoads (Archives)
Weekend Writers
Hannah Ehrlich (Archives)
Matthew Warden (Archives)
Special Contributor
J.R. O'Grady (Archives)
Subscribe to RAB by RSS and Twitter
Follow @RiverAveBlues Search RAB
Spring Training Countdown
Just 5 days 'til pitchers and catchers report.Banner Design By
Attendance is not always tantamount to revenue though … I can only imagine that for at least the Mets, even with 9,000 or so less seats, they’ll be making more $$$ than they did in 2008.
It’ll be really interesting to see how teams like Pittsburgh, Kansas City, or the Brewers do attendance wise.
With the whole auto industry mess Im curious to see how Detroit does.
Oh god yeah, the Tigers have the scariest situation in baseball. Inflated payroll + crappy, injured pitching staff + tough division + horrible economy = not good.
And now they have to pay Shefield for not playing.
AND D-Train. I mean yeah, he’s technically still on the roster, but that’s arguably even worse … that dude is a straight up waste of space at this point, which is too bad because he was fun as hell to watch back in the day.
Damn blood anxiety disorder
I read on rotoworld that he was diagnosed with “anxiety disorder” from a blood test. Never read such stupidity. What’s next? Diagnose someone with OCD from a urine sample?
Hahaha seriously … I mean, if you’re going to lie about an injury, could you at least try to have it make sense?
I heard he actually has Vida Blue’s disease.
It’s like Lou Gehrig’s disease, only different.
Im actually going to a game in Pit. They are playing the Mets..4th row, OF boxes..20 bucks.
With that said, I’d rather sit in the upper deck at YS and know Ill always be watching a competitive team then spend a season sitting near the field in Pit.
No doubt about that…but PNC Park is supposed to be amazing, so hopefully you’ll have a good time and be able to enjoy the scenery at the very least.
Pittsburg is a fun town too. Check out the Iron City Brewery.
burgh*
Thats why Im going. Im going to see our guys play in Cleveland and hitting PNC on the way back, just so I can cross it off my list of stadiums to visit.
BTW..this is from Ken Rosenthal
“The Tigers’ season-ticket base has been cut almost in half, and a number of other teams also are bracing for attendance drops.”
I will be hitting up PNC this year as well afte wnating to see the Yanks there last year. Damn wedding season.
The Tigers bullpen is an absolute disaster. Their rotation isn’t much better either. Was Porcello sent down to AAA?
During the Yankees-Braves game the other day the announcers were hawking season tickets at 75% off, or $6 a game. Wasn’t paying enough attention to hear where the seats were. They also have a buy 2 get 2 free offer. I lived in Atlanta from 1993-1997 and I have to say that lots of people talk about the Braves and put up flags and signs, but they sure don’t leave the couch.
When the negotiations for AJ were going on, I had an argument on another board with a really moronic Braves fan. He actually posted that the reason they don’t go out to games is because the weather is nice AND (get this) there is so much more to do there. He then said “In NY and Boston all you have is cold weather and your sports teams”. I really was at a loss for words…
He also said that the women were better looking, to which someone else replied “yeah, if you like your women with 2 teeth. Tho on the other hand you wouldnt have to worry about calling out the wrong name, just call em all sis”.
Atlanta is the worst sports city in the country. Probably because Atlanta is all types of crazy spread out and has some funky demographics (like the highest percentage of 20-40 year olds who are transplants from another city).
Literally, nobody cares about anything there.
Not even Chipper Jones?
Who decided that building such a small stadium in New York City was a good idea anyway?
Well, they’re confined by the space limitations of the thriving urban neighborhood that they reside in.
What’s that you say? The Mets new CitiField is actually in the middle of a drab, soulless parking lot surrounded by acres of melancholic ennui, and there were no archectural or environmental impact considerations to take into account at all? Oh, my bad, never mind then.
Well, at least they’ll have an awesomely cool and snazzy inaugural season patch to keep themselves warm at night with.
They need to have an Inaugural Season Patch toilet paper night. That way everyone can do with that patch the only thing worth doing.
I’m hijacking this thread. This is too important.
I just read in the comments of the previous post that Mike AXISA (very grown up, using the full name like that) has UNNAMED SOURCES. The kind of sources that tell him about trade talks involving Keppinger and Hall.
Ahem.
I assume all three of our esteemed authors know about this. And thus all have access to said UNNAMED SOURCES.
As a reader I demand to know: was it just a KLaw e-mail he wanted anonymous for some reason, or are you guys real, honest-to-goodness journalists?!
Because if the latter is true, I’ve never been more vicariously proud of a blogger whose work I read.
We all talk to different people in various levels of the know, if that’s what you mean. We’re definitely going to make an effort to provide more original reporting, too. We just have to clear a few more hurdles.
If you ever expand, may daughter graduates college next June with a degree in Journalism concentrating on visual journalism….she will be looking for work
therefore the more professional full name switch. well played
Mike’s anonymous source: The POTUS.
Mike: Hey, Barry, what’s good, dook?
BHO: Nothin much, Axe. Workin on these bills. Boehner’s actin like a little biznatch, you know how it go.
Mike: Yeah. Hey, I heard we’re still working on getting a UTI. Got anything?
BHO: Don’t say you heard it from me, but you’re probably getting Keppinger.
Mike: Yeah?
BHO: Quiet as it’s kept.
Mike: Good looks, Southside.
BHO: No deezy, my neezy.
Mike: Aaaight, ‘waii out!
BHO: ‘Waii out!
… aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand, SCENE!!!
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_f3SZ.....rClap1.jpg
It wasn’t KLaw.
Joba’s line looks really good today!
I know it’s off topic, but I really just wanted to say that.
Way to jinx it!
Eh..it’s only spring training anyway
Final line for the day: 5.1 5 2 2 3 6
And another B-Jobber bites the dust:
“He’s our fifth starter and I’m happy with that,” Posada said. “It’s for the betterment of the team.”
http://yankees.lhblogs.com/200.....s-at-reds/
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go piss on my hands.
Like Rosenthal said, this is going to effect players being traded. Maybe the Yanks’ can take advantage of some salary dumps, if A-Rod doesn’t come back healthy, maybe Beltre like we have discussed here in the past and like Kenny has in his column.
I’m nervous that Boston will be the team who takes advantage of salary dumps more than anyone else. Ever since Boston decided to assemble the DL Allstar Team because they lost out on Tex, its looked like they have a lot of spare change and they’re just waiting for the opportunity to spend it on something worthwhile. I do NOT want to see Magglio Ordonez in their lineup, that is for damn sure.
Eh, if the price for Magglio in their lineup is a good young prospect or two, I’d be okay with seeing Magglio in their lineup. Yeah, he’s good, but he’s also a ticking timebomb; he’s bound to be on the DL for them as well.
I’m more nervous about the Sox being the team that takes on the Miguel Cabrera contract. Ordonez doesn’t scare me like Miggy does.
I just don’t think they deal Miggy.
The Rangers dealt ARod…
Didn’t A-Rod want out pretty bad though? Also, he is a cancer, but seriously they have other contracts I would see them unloading first. Robertson and Magglio are the first that come to mind. I think for them to trade Miggy something would have to go real wrong and wouldn’t they want a couple serious young kids back in return?
Robertson and Magglio may be untradeable, though. Miggy has actual value.
The Rangers didn’t trade Kevin Millwood and Chan Ho Park, they traded ARod.
Got a point, but if they needed to unload a big contract, Maggs would be the first one they would try. I think he is tradeable, but I don’t know anything that the GM’s/owners know. Like Ryan said, Boston, maybe even the Braves if they could come up with money and Detroit eats a bit.
I think considering the current economic conditions, Detroit may be forced to jettison some of their bigger contracts, even if it means eating up a large amount of the salary. If that’s the case, I can definitely see Atlanta (or Boston) making a playoff push and snagging Maggs. I’d like to think that Miggy is being regarded as the cornerstone of the Detroit franchise though, and that they keep him around regardless of how the team fares in 2009 (both competitively and economically).
You guys all know its coming though – a big acquisition by Boston, whether via trade or FA, it is definitely coming. I’ll be happy if it ends up being for Matt Holliday, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if they get someone better.
Yeah, no doubt that Boston getting Miguel Cabrera would be fucking scary. You’d have to imagine that it would be for a package including something like Anderson, Buccholz, Tacoby, and Bard, but still..yikes. Let’s hope Detroit would ask for Lester in return, which does seem pretty fair to me.
Let us never speak of this again.
[...] -Looks like this year might be a down year for attendance in the MLB. [...]
If the Mets can’t sell out a 42,000 seat stadium in it’s first season, why would they want to build a larger one?
Because the economy won’t suck forever and with 17 million in the New York Metropolitan area, demand will eventually far outpace supply.