Related to this week’s readings discussing motivations for watching sports on television, team identification and fandom, a recent AP-AOL poll found that only one third (32%) of Americans are fans of professional baseball (http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061020/NEWS/610200410/1005). A total of 2,002 adults were included in the telephone poll, conducted earlier this month during the League Championship Series. Among other findings:
· more Americans 35 years and older than under 35 considered themselves baseball fans;
· whites were more likely than minorities to classify themselves as baseball fans;
· nearly half of all baseball fans (48%) are hoping Barry Bonds falls short of Hank Aaron’s career home run title;
· more Americans (28%) consider exorbitant salaries as the biggest problem in baseball, followed by cost of game admission (21%), and steroids (19%).
Moreover, Neilson ratings for the baseball playoffs are down considerably this year (http://www.presstelegram.com/sports/ci_4519951), with this year’s World Series between the Tigers and the Cardinals expected to break record low ratings set last year when the White Sox defeated the Astros.
But despite this apparent drop in baseball’s fan appeal, MLB’s single-season attendance record was broken for the third consecutive season, surpassing 75 million people for the first time (http://mlb.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060930&content_id=1691363&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb).
I find it surprising that baseball would only appeal to one-third of Americans. From my observations going to sporting events, baseball seems to have the broadast fan base, with fans from all demographics attending games.
My question is: how many people are baseball fans, will you be watching the World Series this week, and if so, what motivates you to watch (assuming you’re not a fan of either the Cardinals or the Tigers)?
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4 comments:
I am a big fan of baseball and despite my Mets not making the World Series I will watch the games between the Tigers and the Cardinals. I watch and listen to Mets games throughout the season and the odd time actually get to see them play live. While the Mets are the one team I will consistently watch all year I do enjoy the post season and especially the World Series. I have watched every one since I moved to the United States in 1987 the year the Twins beat the Cardinals in that fall's classic.
Outside of the Mets the only games I might watch during the regular season would be the ones between the Red Sox and Yankees. But during the post season I watch nearly every game whether my team is in it or not which in the case of the Mets is usually the latter. The games are competitive, the fans are into them and the atmosphere is electric. It is baseball at its best.
Mike Francesca said on WFAN's Mike and the Mad Dog yesterday that the pace of baseball during the regular season is a turn off to most sports fans but it is the opposite during the play offs. In play off baseball the drama and tension increase with each pitch because of the importance one run or one strike out can have in a single game during a seven game series. The drama that does not exist in April or May definitely exists in October baseball and makes for great television. It is sport at its very best.
I think baseball is one sport that is very parochial in terms of fan support. There will be baseball fans like Greg or myself in Connecticut who will watch the World Series but for the most part viewers will be from the two cities involved.
I think baseball is absolutely still the past time but its clearly losing market share because the amount of money it costs to go to a game is so prohibitive and the availability of tickets is so scarce that it makes it hard to go to the game and enjoy it. Take fenway park for example - granted its a tiny stadium at approximately 36000 seats but to make matters worse, 22000 of those seats are sold to season ticket holders. This means that 2/3 of the stadium are sold out before the public ever get a chance at buying single game tickets. The majority of these package deals are sold to corporations and leave the general public at a loss for good seats.
Back on topic a little more - I think that this week's world series will have low ratings - I will be in St. Louis during games 4 & 5 and look forward to what its like out there and how they handle everything.
This topic certainly gets discussed a lot on "THe Herd." The lack of interest in baseball over the past 5-10 years is staggering, and I'm not really sure what the reason is. I guess as football continues to grow, baseball gets left behind the wayside. Personally, I am a baseball fan, but not an extremely passionate/involved baseball fan. I'll have a game on in the background and if it's a Red Sox/Yankees game, I'll be sure to tune back for the 7th-9th inning (unless it's a blowout), but I'm not one to sit down and watch an entire baseball game. I'm always doing something else and the game is on in the background. This isn't the case with football. Maybe it has something to do with the speed of the game? Society keeps getting quicker and quicker, and so does football. Baseball is the same old 1-minute-between-pitches, lots of commercial breaks, etc. For me, it's easier to follow without actually watching.
As for the World Series...since I work in sports I kind of have to watch, and even if I didn't work in sports, I'd probably flip to see what the score was. But you can be assured that I'll be watching Grey's Anatomy THursday night and flip to the baseball game during the breaks. Unless there's a really compelling story (Kenny Rogers and pine tar was semi-interesting, in my opinion), I'm not going to set my appointment book around the baseball game.
Amanda Gifford
As a baseball fan it saddens me to see the terrible ratings for World Series games. The World Series is the culmination of months and months of games, drama and excitement but in the end, most of America doesn't seem to care much anymore. Yeah, the games are longer but these are the two best teams in MLB slugging it out for a piece of history. But the only thing that's making history are the ratings.
I think part of this is due to the fact that the games start later at night. These later start times make it impossible for young kids to watch the whole game and develop their own tradition of watching the fall classic. Even us bigger kids feel the effects of the later games when the next morning comes around. I fear baseball has lost a generation of fans and these are the effects of that lost generation. With so many other choices on the TV, kids are not chosing to sit and watch the World Series. Most of them are already in bed by the fifth inning, so how can they can into the series when they can hardly watch it? The ideal solution would be earlier start times and later afternoon games on the weekends, but TV will never let that happen. What makes baseball so great is that it's part of Americana, one of the telling trait of our country. Unfortunately, another trait of our country is making baseball a past enjoyment and that is greed.
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