More Fanny Numbers
OMG crunches some more attendance numbers, looking at weeknight games later in homestands, as some of you demanded in comments to my last post. He has a few other ways of looking at it, and it's worth checking out.
Go bitch at him for being negative, too. Why does he have to report silly facts? Can't he just have happy opinions? :(
To clarify, I don't think that DC is a terrible baseball market. And I don't think that 20K fans on Monday night is a completely terrible thing. I'll regurgitate here what I wrote at Primer about it:
Eh.
You've got cheap owners.
Rancorous DC politics.
Salivating media, assuring us that traffic was going to grind to a halt as if DC were overcome by a Buffalo snowstorm.
and cheap owners.
Add it up, and it's not unreasonable.
DC is a fickle market. There's a limited pool of natives, most of whom were at the game. The rest are the transients from all over the country. Why should they give up their teams, the ones they grew up with, for this crapbag team?
When the team wins, they'll draw. Just as they did in mid-2005. When they stink on ice -- as they have SINCE mid-2005 -- nobody cares. I don't think that's a bad market. I think that (in some ways) is a smart market.
I'm GLAD the team isn't being rewarded for dropping payroll below a level that MLB ran it at while moving into a new stadium. I'm GLAD that the team isn't being rewarded for calling Odalis Perez and Paul Lo Duca its big FA acquisitions. And I'm glad they're not being rewarded for trying to pass of their motley collection of future 4th starters as a burgeoning rotation, the next Smoltz and Glavine.
Stan Kasten has repeatedly said that "we'll get the attendance we deserve." He's right. They don't deserve crap with their pisspoor efforts on and off the field. /fanboy_rant
That might be negative, in some ways (and yes, there's the CHEEEEP! cheapshot, but deal), but in other ways it's something positive. The market can and will succeed once there's something worth getting excited about. Anyone who remembers June 2005 and the blitzkrieg that overcame the A's (among others) can attest to that.
To the anonymous commenter from ages ago: HERE'S YOUR ANSWER!!!!111!!!!!!
Go bitch at him for being negative, too. Why does he have to report silly facts? Can't he just have happy opinions? :(
Eh.
You've got cheap owners.
Rancorous DC politics.
Salivating media, assuring us that traffic was going to grind to a halt as if DC were overcome by a Buffalo snowstorm.
and cheap owners.
Add it up, and it's not unreasonable.
DC is a fickle market. There's a limited pool of natives, most of whom were at the game. The rest are the transients from all over the country. Why should they give up their teams, the ones they grew up with, for this crapbag team?
When the team wins, they'll draw. Just as they did in mid-2005. When they stink on ice -- as they have SINCE mid-2005 -- nobody cares. I don't think that's a bad market. I think that (in some ways) is a smart market.
I'm GLAD the team isn't being rewarded for dropping payroll below a level that MLB ran it at while moving into a new stadium. I'm GLAD that the team isn't being rewarded for calling Odalis Perez and Paul Lo Duca its big FA acquisitions. And I'm glad they're not being rewarded for trying to pass of their motley collection of future 4th starters as a burgeoning rotation, the next Smoltz and Glavine.
Stan Kasten has repeatedly said that "we'll get the attendance we deserve." He's right. They don't deserve crap with their pisspoor efforts on and off the field. /fanboy_rant
posted by Chris Needham at
12:16 PM
15 Comments:
oh chris, who says you're negative! certainly not me! :)
however, during such exchanges, i'm often reminded of the boxer carl "the truth" williams. when asked why his nickname was "the truth," he replied...
... because the TRUTH hurts, baby! The truth hurts!
truer words were never spoken!
By
DCPowerGator, at 4/09/2008 12:28 PM
"And I'm glad they're not being rewarded for trying to pass of their motley collection of future 4th starters as a burgeoning rotation, the next Smoltz and Glavine."
Preach on!
I'd settle for a couple Steve Averys.
By
RPS, at 4/09/2008 12:59 PM
Someone on Svrluga's blog yesterday posted what the attendance was for the Washington Senators' second game ever at DC Stadium (now RFK) in 1962: 5,729. That's about 13% of capacity. Hey, even the cheap Lerners were able to bump their second day percent of capacity up to 50%. That's an accomplishment. Celebrate it.
And really, I think the whole cheap owners/no decent free agents thing plays very little if any part in the whole attendance equation. Misguided owners, as I've said in other recent comments, yes. Cheap owners? No. Why? Consider this: In 2005 a team of nobodies came to town. (Zach Day? Terrmel Sledge? Brad Wilkerson? Those were the names we heard that winter, remember.) Nevertheless, 22,500 season tickets were snapped up, and thanks to the fact that they had a good first half, total attendance for the year hit 2.7M.
Then what happened? The previous cheap owners went out and got themselves a name guy (Soriano, ex-Yankee of all things) to complement the hot rookie Zimmerman. The rest of the team is pretty much the same team that had been warmly embraced the season before, yet season tickets drop by 5,000 and total attendance for the year drops by half a million. That didn't happen because of cheap ownership. (I've said before why it did, so I won't repeat it again.)
Actually, of the reasons you've thrown out now, I think the only one that did and will have an appreciable effect on attendance is the bad pub on traffic and parking. And the owners weren't too cheap to try to do anything about that one, they were just misguided again. They ran boatloads of ads to try to change the public's perception on the traffic and parking thing, but their ads were poorly conceived and actually ended up reinforcing the impression that it's so difficult to get to Nationals Park for a game that you might as well not even bother.
By
An Briosca Mor, at 4/09/2008 1:18 PM
Check out OMG's post. He's brought up a good point about those STH numbers.
Basically, that first year was inflated because people figured it was going to be a hotter ticket than it was. Once people realized that it was hard to give the tickets away, those numbers pared back to around the 18K range the last few years. That seems to be the sweet spot for STH.
The key, and the biggest variable, are the walkup crowds. They walk up when the team wins. But when it doesn't, they don't.
By
Chris Needham, at 4/09/2008 1:21 PM
How about (mostly) ridiculous ticket and concession prices? I believe they will take their toll on attendance, at least until the team starts winning. I firmly believe the front office overestimated what the market would bear; they might have sold quite a few more seats if they'd offered more 20-game options and lowered prices across the board. $40 a stub and full-season only for outfield seats? No thanks.
It will be interesting, on a mid-summer weekend, to see how full the $5 grandstand gets vs. the $47 center field club.
By
Carl, at 4/09/2008 1:33 PM
OMG has some good info, but I am going to throw one more thing out there:
Unless you are the Cubs, or an NY team, there's a large attendance spike of fans who are there to see the visiting team. Look at how the Cubs, Yankees, Red Sox, and Mets fill up stadiums everywhere they go.
That is especially prevalent in DC, where we have such a transient fan base anyway. But, there's no such thing as a Marlins fan, either here or in Florida. So, no one comes out on game day to see the Fish. I'll be a lot more concerned if our attendance sucks against the Phillies or Pirates than against the Marlins, Rockies, or D-Backs.
Let's revisit this issue after this week-end, when the Braves have passed through town again.
By
Natsfan74, at 4/09/2008 1:35 PM
I think OMG has stolen the point I've been making in my comments here the last day or so. But I won't press charges.
Yes, I agree that when the team wins it will draw crowds. However, that does not extend to agreeing with your implications that it's because the ownership gives off a "we don't want to win" vibe by not signing any but the most craptastic free agents, or by not locking up Zimmerman long-term, or by whatever else might be the "Lerners are cheap" ranting opportunity du jour, that the attendance isn't better. People came to the games in 2005 because a team full of guys they couldn't even name was winning. More people didn't start coming to the games in early 2006 because Soriano was now on the team. Indeed, 400K of them (5,000 full season equivalents) didn't come to the games that year despite Soriano's presence. People quit coming to the games in 2007 because the entire universe of baseball media had told them the Nationals were going to be the worst team ever, and even by the end of the season a lot of people never realized that wasn't true. Fans of Gil Meche, had he been signed, might have upped last year's total attendance a bit, I'll grant you that. All six of them, at 81 games each would have added a whopping 500 to the year's attendance total.
This year? It's only fanboys like yourself who know the difference between Odious Perez and Kyle Lohse, and you guys are already coming to the games. So the "Lerners are cheap" argument for low attendance just doesn't fly. Now, if they don't start winning and you want to change your slogan to "the Lerners are losers", then I might be willing to concede that you have a point.
By
An Briosca Mor, at 4/09/2008 1:57 PM
"It will be interesting, on a mid-summer weekend, to see how full the $5 grandstand gets vs. the $47 center field club."
Even when they sell all or most of the $5 tickets, I predict that the grandstand section will still look almost empty. Once the view of the Capitol and the Anacostia wears off (which should take at most an inning or two), those fans will be hanging out in the concourses or the Red Porch/Loft and Scoreboard Walk for the rest of the game.
By
An Briosca Mor, at 4/09/2008 2:03 PM
I think the only one that did and will have an appreciable effect on attendance is the bad pub on traffic and parking.
To the extent there's a problem here (and I didn't really detect a huge problem in either game I went to), I'd say it's because the ballpark was rushed to open before the surrounding infrastructure was ready to accommodate it. That was MLB's decision and one the Lernastens certainly supported, and I think they've done some decent measures with the Nats Express, but it's an issue because they wanted to make money off the park as quickly as possible.
Which is fine. I'm not criticizing that at all. But that demand/decision does have consequences.
By
Anonymous, at 4/09/2008 2:08 PM
"How about (mostly) ridiculous ticket and concession prices?"
I keep hearing about the prices, but is there actually any empirical evidence to support such claims?
I did some back of the envelope comparisons of ticket prices in other east coast cities (Phila, Balt, Boston and NY) and DC was right around what everyone else was charging. Now, you may think that baseball ticket prices in general are too high, which is entirely different issue, or you may feel that those other teams offer better value, which they certainly do, but overall, there doesn't seem to be much to grouse about. (Admittedly, tickets prices are difficult to compare between stadiums because you get a little into apples and oranges.)
With the food, it should be pretty easy for someone to compare the Nationals prices with those of the Wizards and other teams in similar markets. Nothing at Nationals Park struck me as that different from what they charge at Verizon. But that was purely off memory and it would be interesting to see a side-by-side breakdown comparing the Nationals to other teams.
By
RPS, at 4/09/2008 2:11 PM
I did what now?
Everything is connected. The fans don't come because the team isn't winning. The team isn't winning because the owners aren't spending money. The owners aren't spending money because it hasn't been shown to effect the fans attendance (see Soriano year).
People like Chris (and I) want the cycle broken by the owners first. Create a new cycle: Spend a little more money, win a few more games, get a few more people in the crowds, rinse repeat.
The owners (theoretically) want the cycle broken by the team. New Cycle: Win a few more games, get a few more people in the crowds, spend a little more money, rinse repeat.
It's the "theorectically" that's bothersome though. If they owners broke the old cycle first and it was successful we could reasonably expect them to repeat the new cycle. If the team breaks the cycle - there's no guarantee that the owners will spend that money to keep the new cycle going. Until it happens one is perfectly justified being wary.
By
Harper, at 4/09/2008 2:15 PM
To make a bit of a random segue from ABM's excellent obervation that grandstand ticket holders will be likely to take the game in from locations other than their seats, I have noticed that the stadium has room for a tremendously high number of Standing Room Only tickets it could sell if and when playoff games or the All-Star Game come to town. Pretty much ringing the entire outfield and all behind the 300s at the very least. Looks like the Nats could get another 2K-3K in the stadium in those cases. And most of those SRO options, particularly in the 300s, are available today and better than a high percentage of seats.
By
Unknown, at 4/09/2008 4:03 PM
Chris: I find this to be perhaps the LEAST negative comment you have ever posted! I have always assumed/trusted that Stan must know DC only supports winners. He has never lived here, though. Mark Lerner should know that and see it as a Caps owner. We will see; nothing so far to make me fear otherwise. Stan's 'cheap bastard' comment to the Lerner's (if true) hits the mark. If my hopes are true, bad attendance can drive a better product, as you point out.
Secondly, you have thought me to be a Chico lover in the past. Again, I totally agree with you in that he has shown some improvement but would do well to work on the leg kick in the minors, perhaps even for a full season. No shame in that if he can work out his mechanics.
Maybe you were just cranky in the offseason! Come opening day, it is back in the swing of things. My wife says I become 'summer guy', like in Fever Pitch, this time of the year. You, too?
By
Anonymous, at 4/09/2008 5:11 PM
RPS, while I agree with you on the concession prices- they're expensive but what major league team doesn't charge an arm and a leg for food- I'm not with you on ticket prices.
I don't think it's a fair to compare the Nats to the Yankees or Red Sox. They both have large, established, devoted fan bases. Many fans would be willing to spend far upwards of the face value... if only they could get their hands on them. A friend of mine just spent $200 on a pair of bleacher seats (their face value is $52) for a Red Sox game against the Brewers!
My biggest complaint with the Nats ticket pricing is the "cheap seats"- the upper deck and, particularly, the outfield seats. For some reason, when they built this stadium they thought they could charge fans the same rates (if not more expensive) for outfield seats as they could for other areas of the ballpark.
While some will say, the outfield seats are nice and not the typical bleacher seats you'd find in most outfields, they still have the same view as bleacher seats. The cheapest (and worst) outfield seat costs $35. This price far exceeds prices for similar ballparks (I'm using Philadelphia, Baltimore and Pittsburgh as comparable cities).
In Philly, the BEST outfield seats cost $24.
In Baltimore, it's $25.
In Pittsburgh it's $17.
Granted, these parks might not offer the same luxuries as Nationals Park, but at least in Philly they're offering a far better product on the field, which is what ultimately matters. There's a pretty substantial disparity between the price of the OF seats in Washington and other cities (even in Boston, the OF seats only cost $26!). Right now the Nats are hardly in a position to have some of the most expensive seats in the league.
If they keep these prices as high as they are, the seats are going to continue to remain empty. The picture Chris posted yesterday shows that they managed to fill about the first 4 rows of each section. Besides from the obvious disaster that is the Presidential seats behind home plate, the outfield seats will very likely be the most sparsely filled seats for the rest of the season.
By
Anonymous, at 4/09/2008 5:23 PM
FWIW,
I think the general consensus among unbiased (non-Nats) fans is that the stadium is average, just OK, decent, etc.......couple that with a losing club and attendance is not going to be good.
Barring a solid run this year, they absolutely need to drop prices next season; from the outfield bleachers to that stupid fucking 'Presidents Club' or 'Diamond club' or whatever the hell they call the seats behind home plate. ($300??....seriously?)
By
Rob B, at 4/09/2008 5:51 PM
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