meh...
The financial bottom line for MLB is good enough. So much so that the going rate for an ‘every day’ player tops $10 million.
Plenty of young stars that will probably play for another 15 years, and they’re far from all Hispanic. Corey Seager, Cody Bellinger, Alex Bregman, Byron Buxton, Mookie Betts, etc.
NBA Breaks All-Time Attendance Record for Fourth Straight Year
See New York Fed: Total Household Debt.
-PJ
There are simply too many dates on the baseball calendar and too many teams in the postseason. This pushes the start of the season into March and the end of the World Series to late October.
I also think almost every major sport has the same problem, for what it's worth.
Baseball used to be on Free TV. Now you need a subscription to something to watch it.
That was stupid. Really stupid.
That said, I have been concerned for a while about slow play. It should not take four hours to play a baseball game. There have been some rules changes, so we'll see what those do.
I have been following the Texas Rangers games for about 5 years. I have noticed during that time at both home and away games the stadiums are more than half empty.
If they seem to be getting close to being play-off contenders, their home game attendance improves significantly.
Teams may be getting enough in TV royalties, because nearly every game is broadcasted.
I watched part of that game—cuddled up with my dog next to the wood stove. ;-)
A near blizzard in KC last Saturday for the Angel game. Sunday’s game cancelled because it was too cold to play.
Gee, I wonder what could be causing low attendance?
This global warming appears to be putting the kibosh on April outdoor activity... Don’t worry, Al Gore and his minions have the answer... More global cooling.
This global warming appears to be putting the kibosh on April outdoor activity... Don’t worry, Al Gore and his minions have the answer... More global cooling.
It’s weather. It’s been awful for baseball all over the country. Cold, rainy, snowy. Just miserable.
Lower quality of players across the board.
Last year, the SF Giants went from sellouts for each game for years to a lot of vacant seats at every game, and you can’t blame the weather.
Poor playing, pitching and managing resulted in a lot of vacant seats in the last few months of last year.
A generous neighbor could not find people to give his 4 season tickets to last year for the G’s. No one wanted them.
The G’s just finished a 4 game series in San Diego, and it looked like there were as many vacant seats as filled ones. They had great weather there for those 4 games.
The West coast teams play more games at night. A night game starts at 7 pm and doesn’t end until 3-4 hours later. Even with minimal commutes, you don’t get get home until midnight or later. Also, who wants to be in a parking lot at midnight anywhere in America.
Besides lower caliber players, the cost per ticket, for any food, parking and ??? is out of sight and has to be contributing to lower attendance.
Get back to day games, reduce the ticket prices and the food prices at the games.
The weather was very bad. Rare for april. Thats all
Just think how many tweets and facebook updates you can do during one inning.
My Democratic neighbor paid $75 for a ticket to see Tampa Bay lose again.
It's April 16, and Minneapolis has regressed into pure winter. I'm pretty sure Baseball is a summer game.
Too many teams have diluted the talent pool.
DH is atrocious and potentially burning out AL pitchers.
Emphasis on launch angle eliminates manufacturing of runs.
Inter-league unbalanced the schedule.
Games too long and start too late. Not easily accessible to impatient youngsters - aka the next generation of fans
Baseball is a thinking man’s game while modern culture doesn’t exactly promote “thinking”.
Schedule too long - playoffs should never occur in weather that resembles April.
We went to see the Mariners play the Oakland A's in Seattle yesterday afternoon. I was freezing up in the stands. Safeco Field does have a roof; but, it is open on the sides and the wind was very cold coming in off the Sound. We left in the 7th.
No games should be scheduled in the upper portion of the U.S. until the third week of April, unless there is a closed stadium. Go to Southern California, Arizona, Texas, Atlanta, Florida.
That would have to have some bearing on whether or not they support sports?
I know the snowflake generation doesn't like motorcycles and that's taking a hit lately. Except mopeds and the other girly man scooters.
And snowflakes aren't into guitars and that's taking a hit.
And they're too stupid and lazy to make it through basic training so a ready military is suffering.
Maybe pro sports will cease to have an audience? Nah! Too good to be true.