From the MLB All-Star Game, Washington, D.C.
Major League Baseball and the host club Nationals put on a power-laden, well-received show for the Home Run Derby and All-Star Game last week. But close behind the festive mood surrounding the All-Star events were heightened concerns about attendance, still one of baseball’s core revenue streams.
The league, union, teams and many of the sport’s business partners are increasingly worried about the sharp drop at the turnstiles this year and what it means for the sport and its fan appeal. At the All-Star break, MLB was down more than 5 percent in attendance, the league’s largest drop since the rugged national recession days of 2009. The percentage drop is also far larger than the 0.5 to 2 percent swings MLB typically sees in a given year.
Rainouts have played a role this season, but they don’t fully explain the large number of empty seats at MLB games.getty images
Earlier in the year, much of the drop was tagged to record numbers of rainouts and cold weather, particularly in the Northeast and Midwest, during April and early May. But as the season has continued and summer weather has arrived, the attendance numbers have only improved marginally. As a result, the sport’s leaders have had little choice but to acknowledge other factors are also at play.
MLB Players Association Executive Director Tony Clark, himself a former big-league player, wondered whether fans may be getting turned off by the current style of play that is leading to fewer balls in play than ever.
“It may get to a point where those coming to the ballpark, for whatever reason, aren’t 100 percent certain that what they’re seeing is the game they want to see,” Clark said.
Commissioner Rob Manfred insisted the league’s product remains “fundamentally sound.” But he, too, has repeatedly expressed a desire to play a more proactive role in managing on-field changes to the game, and in turn how that appeals to fans.
Also at play, particularly in the minds of agents, is a perceived drag on ticket sales fueled by clubs pursuing multiyear rebuilding efforts.
“If we can stop diluting the product, we’re fine. It’s like putting out a billboard saying you’re going to be non-competitive,” said agent Scott Boras, who represents many of the game’s more prominent stars, including Bryce Harper and J.D. Martinez. “It’s the classic soup can that you’re going to kick down the aisle, scrape up the label and say, ‘Buy soup.’ That doesn’t work.”
In the meantime, many clubs are looking to be more opportunistic in the second half of the season with their marketing, and in many cases are looking to more heavily promote individual games. The Oakland A’s, for example, on July 22 opened “Mount Davis” at the Oakland Coliseum, tarped over for baseball since 2005, for an interleague game against San Francisco, a more notable example of short-run targeted efforts being planned in many markets.
“We could set an all-time attendance record [at the Coliseum],” A’s President Dave Kaval said. “Maybe the biggest crowd of any ballpark this year.”
