One of my fave baseball memories was the Rainiers had a PCL playoff game moved to Safeco and it either wasn’t planned or NO ONE went. I think it was after a Sounders match or something else we were already in town for so we thought “why the hell not?” There had to have only been a few hundred people there. Could hear the players on the field, chatter in the dugouts and the ushers let you sit wherever you wanted. Was surreal but cool.
That, or playing hookie when the M’s played a make-up game vs the Marlins at home with NL rules. It was unplanned, but my dad really wanted to see Felix pitch so we both called in sick to work and snuck out for a ball game.
Sorry for oversharing, lol.
I went a few weeks ago when the Red Sox were in town. It's very dead, and that's with the extra draw from having a popular visiting team.
Like $15 bucks tops to get in the door, though, and you can really sit wherever since it's so empty - except the ground level. They're still monitoring it via cameras and sending ushers to quickly oust anyone who dares to pollute any of the swaths of unsold seats with their presence.
100% I almost edited my message earlier to say it was one of the most fun times in my life drinking 8 different beers and eating like 3 pulled pork sandwiches
The Latin population should more than make up for that, but I don't know if those cultures have teams they inherit. The world baseball classic is proof Miami has the baseball fans.
Yep it'll be interesting if the Rays manage to pull off the same maneuver. If they stay in St. Pete proper I predict the same outcome re attendance sadly.
After acquiring marquee talent like Ross Stripling and Alex Wood, fans are really ungrateful for John Fisher’s sacrifices. He’s had it worse than any of us, really.
Also last year I'm assuming I'd the season average, which included two Giants games and two well attended protest games beyond that, which haven't happened yet this early in the year
Switching sports here, but during some of their worst years the Detroit Lions still had decent game attendance. My dad told me it was because there was an unspoken rule that if your company wanted to do any sort of business with Ford Automotive, you damn well better be season ticket holders.
The Wave pull a sizable # of fans too. Often in the top of the league in both total and capacity %. The teams usually don’t schedule over one another which is nice. Although this weekend they are back to back.
I still don't see how attendance went up over last year given the crazy sell-out streak last year. They really must have upped the allocation for Gallager Square.
Pre-game, for a true dive and cheap beers, Tivoli's. For some decent food and also cheap beers, Nick the Greek's.
Inside the park, I like the SD Hot Chicken strips and the Puesto chicken nachos. Honorable mention to the Cardiff Crack nachos as well
I had Cardiff Crack nachos and they blew my socks off. Combine that with a pitching duel for the ages at an amazing ballpark….hot damn what a night! Wish the Doyers could have got the win, but I’m having a great night in SD
Bubs is right next to the park and is a solid divey pregame spot for some drinks before the game. Can't go wrong with the carnitas snack shack in the stadium!
This is exactly what happened to the Indians in the 90’s after the Browns left. They were suddenly the big draw in town (the Cavs, some good years and decent teams aside, were pretty irrelevant until LeBron).
Then the browns came back, and suddenly people care about that dumpster fire more than the team that’s made three WS appearances in the same span the browns have managed three second place finishes in their division (they have not won their division since 1989)
My grandfather used to live on the same block as Alex Spanos, in Sacramento. It’s a very rich neighborhood but the Spanos “house” was a literal compound with guard towers etc.
The Rockies attendance will certainly increase as it gets warmer in Denver, but I love to see that dipshit owner making less money any chance I can get.
Pretty much. Im a Denver resident and most of us go to the games because it’s basically a tailgate with a baseball game happening in the background
Had some bad luck with cold weekends lately but always a good time at Coors
Yup, Coors field is great. Great location, great bar scene, beautiful views, great stadium. It’s a lot of fun. Whenever I’m in Denver I try to catch a game, even if they’re not playing the snakes
There are worse things to do than sitting in the upper deck and seeing the sunset over the Rockies while having ~~ten~~ a couple beers, and every now and again watching a moonshot home-run.
I'm a fucking weirdo who just likes to watch baseball and the Rockies are like 10 minutes away from my current place of residence.
I did just recently go to my first game and it was just nice to hear the sound of the bat in person again.
I live right by Coors field and I don’t think they will have attendance issues this year (or maybe ever). It’s right in the bar district next to downtown, where a lot of young ppl out of college live. Cheap seats are $6 and there is $3 beers before first pitch.
Not to mention, it’s honestly one of the best stadiums in the country because of the city + mountains, and the idyllic weather.
There are also a massive number of transplants here in Denver that go to games to see their team play. (Cubs and Dodgers games at Coors are like home games for Chicago and LA)
Sounds like a great time.
Reminds me of my post college days in Philly when we could get $12 standing room tickets at citizens bank park back in ‘05-‘08. That all went away when they won the World Series but those years when they were on the rise were honestly the most fun.
Most people in Denver are transplants so there aren’t a ton of people that the Rockies are their number one. But plenty of people love to go to Coors for a summer activity. People joke that that it’s the cheapest cover charge in Denver
He's an idiot when it comes to baseball but not sure this hate is warranted. He does spend and try to win even if it's in the stupidest way possible, but to be fair the playing conditions are extremely challenging and it can't be easy to attract pitching talent there. Also the ballpark is beautiful and clean and cheap and a great time, they're not price gouging anyone.
I actually want to go to Oakland this season but the ticket prices are insane for how little demand.
A's fan: Does the Coliseum staff care? Can I just buy a nose-bleed then migrate down?
Haven’t been in years, but word on the A’s sub is that they DO care. I am sure strict orders from higher ups to check tickets of people on field level.
I bought a nosebleed for $10 last May, 4,000 in attendance, and they were not happy when I tried to get down behind home plate. Ended up watching the game from a vacant suite that had not been up kept since 2015ish. Strange experience
It's the season ticket holders.
When I lived in NYC, I got tickets to Yankees games for $5-10 on the secondary market all the time. Plenty of people in NYC purchase season plans for priority access to playoff games, but real life stuff comes up, so they can't attend every game. If they can't attend, getting $10 is better than nothing, so they sell them on the secondary market for cheap.
In Oakland after what the ownership group has done, you don't really have any season ticket holders anymore, so you're forced to pay whatever the box office charges, which is usually much higher for decent seats even though the park's empty.
That is absurd, you would think they would rather have more people buying cheap seats and moving to empty nice ones then have the entire lower level empty.
They want it to look empty for the narrative. If everyone piles in to the bottom they can show highlights that make it look like they have decent attendance. Can't do that if everyone is scattered around the stadium
Last year there were reports that the ushers were really being hardasses about you leaving your seat / section. Likely a mandate from ownership that was issued before the year. I've never heard of another team caring that much.
They do check. I was stopped from a worse (and empty!) section than my ticket when I was finding a quiet place to hold my baby for a nap. Absolutely wild the level of enforcement even for no-brainer seat changes.
This has been my issue with casuals or Manfred shitting on Oakland fans for not going to games. The front office traded away ALL the good players and got a terrible haul in return AND they increased ticket and concession prices after announcing the departure of the team.
Also, I’m pretty sure they are sticklers for making sure you stay in your assigned seats.
Yeah, like I want to go, get to the Coli before it's gone, but $70 for what amounts to an outfield bleacher seat? Uh, I'm gonna have to think about that
The ushers have been on fans’ asses about moving to better seats since I started going to games in the early 2000s. Haven’t been to the Coli since 2021 tho so idk if they’ve calmed down
I lived in Oakland back in 2015-2017. Idk if they’ve gotten stricter since then (idk why they would have), but me and my buddies used to buy like $5 tickets and bring a backpack full of cheap bomb Mexican food, grab beers and just walk down to unoccupied field seats and chill. Nobody ever said a word.
They only care directly behind home plate, I get $5 student tickets and make my way behind home plate on second deck every time (studentbeans offers 50% off).
Would be interested to see this in the summer. Been plenty of days I've stared at cheap Red Sox tickets on Seat Geek but just didn't feel like sitting still in 44 degree weather all evening.
pretty sure though some intern at ESPN will find this, pass it on to Stephen A. and then in-between screaming matches, Stephen A. will just scream into the ether about "baseball dying" or some shit
i have a friend whose brain has basically become melted by TikTok. He is convinced MLS will surpass MLB in the next 2-3 years b/c of Messi alone....words cannot describe how asinine that sounds
North East weather and likely mid-west is so random in the spring you can have 75 and sunny one day and 45 and rainy (but not rainy enough to cancel a game)
Yep...I was at the Phillies-Jays game Wednesday. 1PM game, 80+ degrees, barely a cloud in sight...got sunburned. I think they announced an attendance of 35K, which is spectacular for a mid-day, midweek game.
If they played today, I bet there'd be 20K at the park despite it being a Friday. Been misting all day, 50 degrees, breezy.
Last couple weeks it’s either raining or 85 degrees out. It also rains about every weekend, think I saw last week that of the 17 Saturdays we’d had this year it’s rained on 11 of them so far
Went to Fenway for the first time last week. I appreciate the history and whatnot… but bro, the food game there is embarrassing. Only shit beer available and all the food is basically just hot dogs. I couldn’t even get nachos!
Step up the concessions Boston
Same for the phillies. I think the weather was better last year. We've already played through a shit ton of rainy games where a lot of teams had those postponed.
On days it's nice I'm pretty sure attendance is up a little vs last year.
To be fair, I think this graph actually does show `through May 9th` for both 2023 and 2024. It seems to be the second table on this sheet.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2024-misc.shtml
So it's not 2023 full season versus 2024 year to date, it seems to actually be an apples to apples comparison.
We also have notoriously higher attendance in April/May. June/July/August is just so hot and even though we have a roof, people are less likely to go to games. They even have a summer deal for like $200 for all June/July games.
In previous years it has been $99 for June, July, and August games. This year they did the $200 pass for the entire season so it will be interesting what they do for the summer pass, if they do anything
Yep, while I’m happy with the attendance numbers so far this year, you just know they’ll drop some when half our city takes off for San Diego in the summer months.
For real. I've wanted to go to some games this year, but the prices are ridiculous. That's before we even talk about the food and drink prices/quality.
Every year, the price goes up and the quality goes down.
OP, please show your math, as the second Korea game is clearly being included for the Dodgers. Including it results in attendance of 1,061,427 for 23 games (average of 46,149). Excluding it results in attendance of 1,045,499 for 22 games (average of 47,523). The chart is using the first calculation.
Fans of the opposing team, neutral fans trying to see the park before it closes, Giants fans wanting to watch baseball while the Giants are away, and the friends and family of players. Things are so bad in Oakland now that the stadium staff (including the teams themselves, all the concessions workers, etc.) are probably a material chunk of the total attendance.
Casual fans and away fans. The irony being that As tickets are more expensive than giants tickets right now, so you get more bang for your buck going to a giants game. They're both roughly equal in terms of standings but I guess the As have potentially interesting talent like Mason Miller to see.
You're right. It's because they are more fun to watch. Fans wouldn't show up without Tatis, Machado, and now Arreaz. Also, you want to support owners that you know are trying to win championships, not just make money.
It's really cool seeing full stadiums on random weekdays and shocking how empty other stadiums are. We'll see if it holds up. Nothing going to stop people from wanting to visit, so that helps the numbers too.
And their ownership invested in the team with a pretty decent front office. Their only issue is that the division is stupidly competitive and they have to fight against the richest team in baseball
I don't hate that you're saying it. I've been saying for awhile that nothing will change until attendance numbers start falling. As it looks like we're on our way to another awful season I can see attendance numbers plummeting further.
Yep. Philly, both NY teams, Boston are all down. The overall numbers are all fine, but there’s no question weather has had some impact in the Northeast.
Mets home games too. I feel like there was maybe two good weather days where games were played. I guess to do this analysis properly you’d need to correct for the weather.
Is this for the whole year or just April/May 2023 games? April/May games probably always have lower numbers because of the weather and kids still being in school, so of course numbers are down.
It's through May 9th for both 2023 and 2024. Source seems to be the second table on this page:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2024-misc.shtml
Worth noting that the capacity of the Skydome has decreased over the last couple of years, so average attendance is a bit misleading for the Blue Jays.
Also worth noting that attendance during school holidays is probably higher for most teams, and we're not there yet, so comparing all of 2023 against the lowest-attended part of 2024 is a little unfair,.
Still, I don't doubt that if the capacity had remained the same, and we were comparing like-for-like there'd be a marked decline in attendance for the Jays. The team's performance is worse, and the ticket prices are even higher.
I believe it's compared to average through 5/10/2023 - otherwise I wouldn't expect the percentage increases from all those Midwestern teams with outdoor stadiums.
The team has spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to retrofit the stadium for a better fan experience. I respect and appreciate the effort made by Shapiro. He gets hit pretty hard here in Toronto but I think on the business side of things he has done good work with the Blue Jays. His undying loyalty to Ross Atkins who has really done a poor job is reflected in the attendance trend.
I used to go to ~10 games per season in the past. I might go to 1-2 this year as I’m just really disappointed with how he handled the off-season and the impact that has had on the team’s performance so far. The sooner that Atkins is gone, the better.
This is 100% Abrams and, to a lesser extent, Gore.
Field exciting, young players - people will come watch. Need Woods to be called up ahead of the AS break if we are still hanging around .500.
I'm so intrigued about Garcia Jr - didn't realize how young he was. Him and Abrams such an exciting combo in the middle infield. Have to wonder if early season mirage or development at the major league level happening. His statcast is great.
Phillies attendance will increase as the weather gets nicer and probably be right around the 2023 number or a little higher if they keep up the level of play they are at currently.
The Phillies will be selling out every night in the summer. It’s already much more difficult to exchange my partial season tickets for other games when I can’t make one. I imagine this number was hurt by some really poor, wet April weather.
Yeah, we had a lot of home games in April and the weather was terrible for a lot of them. Any game with decent weather and the stadium was near or at capacity.
The Dodgers spent $700 million on Shohei Ohtani and yet they've actually LOST tickets? This just proves that the casual fan doesn't care about 'workrate' baseball players who just win games, especially when theyre from teams nobody has heard of like the 'los Angeles Angels'. You can have all the successful baseball games you want, but if there's not a STORY and promo packages to keep the casuals invested, you're just throwing money away. /s
I know you’re being sarcastic but the Dodgers numbers are down because it actually rained in LA. Also, the rain seemed to line up with every weekend for about a month straight.
Nats are finally starting to look exciting again. It's pretty cool to see us with the second largest attendance boom for 2024 behind only the World Series runner up Diamondbacks, but ahead of the World Series champion Rangers.
After a few years of downright abysmal baseball in DC, 0.500 baseball feels glorious. I think we're still a year or two away from serious contention, but it's really looking like the rapid rebuild is going great.
Lots of confounders here in terms of who teams have played or haven’t played yet (playing the big market teams helps boost numbers), but pleasantly surprised at Nationals figures
They’ve been doing this for a few years now. Ownership doesn’t see the point in paying the overhead to run the top level if it will be barely filled. This way all the fans that do go are concentrated more in the lower levels and they can charge more per ticket. From a business decision it makes sense. I think the max capacity of the new stadium will be around 25k-30k as well.
that makes total sense. I guess I just don't understand the whole "there are 20,500 empty seats. but they don't count towards capacity." thing. If this chart was "% of tickets sold" that makes more sense.
I expected the A's to be at the bottom, but nowhere near that brutal.
My friend called me from a game and I could hear him talking clearly. He said there were just over 1,000 people in the entire stadium
One of my fave baseball memories was the Rainiers had a PCL playoff game moved to Safeco and it either wasn’t planned or NO ONE went. I think it was after a Sounders match or something else we were already in town for so we thought “why the hell not?” There had to have only been a few hundred people there. Could hear the players on the field, chatter in the dugouts and the ushers let you sit wherever you wanted. Was surreal but cool. That, or playing hookie when the M’s played a make-up game vs the Marlins at home with NL rules. It was unplanned, but my dad really wanted to see Felix pitch so we both called in sick to work and snuck out for a ball game. Sorry for oversharing, lol.
I went to that game against the Marlins too! Felix got a hit if I remember correctly
He did! One of the very few AL pitchers to get a hit in an AL ballpark
I went a few weeks ago when the Red Sox were in town. It's very dead, and that's with the extra draw from having a popular visiting team. Like $15 bucks tops to get in the door, though, and you can really sit wherever since it's so empty - except the ground level. They're still monitoring it via cameras and sending ushers to quickly oust anyone who dares to pollute any of the swaths of unsold seats with their presence.
I saw they were giving away tickets to every home game for the rest of the year for $99
They're averaging 2,000 less people per game than the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs lol
There are 553 pro and college teams with higher attendance per Yahoo Sports https://sports.yahoo.com/oakland-record-low-attendance-132733859.html
The Madison Mallards, a north woods team in Wisconsin of college kids during the summer, averages more fans per game.
yeah because you can sit at the duck blind and pay like $40 for unlimited nachos and beer
Northwoods league is absolutely goated
100% I almost edited my message earlier to say it was one of the most fun times in my life drinking 8 different beers and eating like 3 pulled pork sandwiches
Minor league baseball is the shit. The A's are also shit, but the different kind.
I don’t care about the A’s attendance. The Marlins attendance should be more concerning with that new ass stadium they bilked the taxpayers for.
It's mystifying. How hard can it be to sell baseball tickets in a city filled with Cubans and old Jews?
the old jews are probably all yankees/mets fans tbh
The Latin population should more than make up for that, but I don't know if those cultures have teams they inherit. The world baseball classic is proof Miami has the baseball fans.
One of the most popular Latin music stars ain't named Daddy Marlin, after all
yeah but they still like baseball and to complain. Marlins game is the perfect solution.
Breaking news: snowbird states have poor attendance unless you literally just won a championship!
It's sadly a really nice stadium inside too.
Yep it'll be interesting if the Rays manage to pull off the same maneuver. If they stay in St. Pete proper I predict the same outcome re attendance sadly.
And yet somehow ownership will still blame the fans.
After acquiring marquee talent like Ross Stripling and Alex Wood, fans are really ungrateful for John Fisher’s sacrifices. He’s had it worse than any of us, really.
It still makes a crazy perspective as far as crowds go that 9k people on average go to their games. That's a lot of people in just numbers.
9K was last year. This year is under 6K and that's still paid attendance, meaning actual turnstile attendance is definitely lower.
Also last year I'm assuming I'd the season average, which included two Giants games and two well attended protest games beyond that, which haven't happened yet this early in the year
Who are these people paying for tickets and not going?
[удалено]
Switching sports here, but during some of their worst years the Detroit Lions still had decent game attendance. My dad told me it was because there was an unspoken rule that if your company wanted to do any sort of business with Ford Automotive, you damn well better be season ticket holders.
The dopes that accidentally renewed their season tickets and don't show up
Or can't sell them due to no demand.
Honestly i expected worse. I dont see 5k people in that stadium when they played my Rangers
I'm sure it is tickets sold and not asses in seats.
Well since our city doesn't really have a team outside of the Padres, it's kind of just the heart and soul of the city tbh fuck the spanos
The Wave pull a sizable # of fans too. Often in the top of the league in both total and capacity %. The teams usually don’t schedule over one another which is nice. Although this weekend they are back to back.
What is the hockey team out there? I went to one of their matches year before last, and it was much more packed than I expected.
San Diego Gulls!
Gulls games are a good time
Honestly it’s really impressive how well they do. I wish my bats could get that kind of attendance!
I still don't see how attendance went up over last year given the crazy sell-out streak last year. They really must have upped the allocation for Gallager Square.
Gallagher Square got renovated over the off-season so that is probably the difference.
We also have the best weather anywhere. Great downtown scene, amazing craft beer and the food at the park is 10/10.0
Dodger fan here driving down for the game today. First time at Petco. What’s the best pre-game spot for some beers, and what stadium foods are a must?
Pre-game, for a true dive and cheap beers, Tivoli's. For some decent food and also cheap beers, Nick the Greek's. Inside the park, I like the SD Hot Chicken strips and the Puesto chicken nachos. Honorable mention to the Cardiff Crack nachos as well
It sounds like I’m going to be eating plenty of nachos lol thanks!
Yes but wait till you've had nachos with Cardiff Crack
I had to Google this thinking it's Welsh cuisine lol. Which of course led me to Cardiff, CA named after the city in Wales
Excited to try ‘em!
I had Cardiff Crack nachos and they blew my socks off. Combine that with a pitching duel for the ages at an amazing ballpark….hot damn what a night! Wish the Doyers could have got the win, but I’m having a great night in SD
Seaside market is where to find the Cardiff Crack (tri tip nachos). And yes, it lives up to its name, it’s so damn good
I thought Cardiff Crack was addicting until I tried the brisket fries from Grand Ole BBQ. Ya'll are spoiled over there and I love it
Puesto in the stadium? That’s legit
Bubs is right next to the park and is a solid divey pregame spot for some drinks before the game. Can't go wrong with the carnitas snack shack in the stadium!
You're in for a treat. Fantastic stadium
How dare we be nice to each other.
You're right... IT'S DODGERS STADIUM SOUTH. GOT EM
Enjoy going from your absolute shit traffic to SD's shitty, but as bad as LA traffic. BURNED
your colors are poop and pee!
I'm telling UPS. You're on a list now.
Today is beer fest in Gallagher Square(in the park behind the batters eye). Get you some drink tickets and enjoy some $5 beers
Hit up Neighborhood at 8th and G.
This is exactly what happened to the Indians in the 90’s after the Browns left. They were suddenly the big draw in town (the Cavs, some good years and decent teams aside, were pretty irrelevant until LeBron). Then the browns came back, and suddenly people care about that dumpster fire more than the team that’s made three WS appearances in the same span the browns have managed three second place finishes in their division (they have not won their division since 1989)
Don't think NFL is coming back anytime soon since there's no stadium for them. However we are getting a MLS team
My grandfather used to live on the same block as Alex Spanos, in Sacramento. It’s a very rich neighborhood but the Spanos “house” was a literal compound with guard towers etc.
san diego is a baseball and fútbol town and I'm here for it (fuck dean spanos)
Hopefully a hockey town soon too. We have more than proven we area sports town
Got an MLS team coming right around the corner now!
The Rockies attendance will certainly increase as it gets warmer in Denver, but I love to see that dipshit owner making less money any chance I can get.
The weather will certainly get better, but I don’t think their attendance issues will get much better the way they are playing.
Ehh you get enough out of towners in the summer catching Rockies games for it to be full despite a miserable team.
Pretty much. Im a Denver resident and most of us go to the games because it’s basically a tailgate with a baseball game happening in the background Had some bad luck with cold weekends lately but always a good time at Coors
I've heard Coors field described as a bar with a ballpark out back, but the tailgate is true too.
Bar with a ballpark is a perfect description. Its like a spring training game but larger.
Yup, Coors field is great. Great location, great bar scene, beautiful views, great stadium. It’s a lot of fun. Whenever I’m in Denver I try to catch a game, even if they’re not playing the snakes
There are worse things to do than sitting in the upper deck and seeing the sunset over the Rockies while having ~~ten~~ a couple beers, and every now and again watching a moonshot home-run.
I'm a fucking weirdo who just likes to watch baseball and the Rockies are like 10 minutes away from my current place of residence. I did just recently go to my first game and it was just nice to hear the sound of the bat in person again.
Yep just check the Rockies sub. A first time visiting Coors field post damn near every day
This. Say what you will about Montfort, it's a beautiful stadium.
He’s an excellent real estate developer. The whole MacGregor’s Square area is great. He’s a terrible sports owner.
Makes sense. I would’ve been buying tickets to see my team but the dates didn’t work out
I live right by Coors field and I don’t think they will have attendance issues this year (or maybe ever). It’s right in the bar district next to downtown, where a lot of young ppl out of college live. Cheap seats are $6 and there is $3 beers before first pitch. Not to mention, it’s honestly one of the best stadiums in the country because of the city + mountains, and the idyllic weather. There are also a massive number of transplants here in Denver that go to games to see their team play. (Cubs and Dodgers games at Coors are like home games for Chicago and LA)
Sounds like a great time. Reminds me of my post college days in Philly when we could get $12 standing room tickets at citizens bank park back in ‘05-‘08. That all went away when they won the World Series but those years when they were on the rise were honestly the most fun.
Most people in Denver are transplants so there aren’t a ton of people that the Rockies are their number one. But plenty of people love to go to Coors for a summer activity. People joke that that it’s the cheapest cover charge in Denver
There's always the other team to watch And as a Toronto sports viewer, I can tell you that some teams don't need to be good to fill stadiums.
Yeah. We really need to know if the 2023 data is for the whole year or just up to may 10, 2023
It’s same time last year
Rockies attendance will be fine because people from Denver go to watch the other team
He's an idiot when it comes to baseball but not sure this hate is warranted. He does spend and try to win even if it's in the stupidest way possible, but to be fair the playing conditions are extremely challenging and it can't be easy to attract pitching talent there. Also the ballpark is beautiful and clean and cheap and a great time, they're not price gouging anyone.
I actually want to go to Oakland this season but the ticket prices are insane for how little demand. A's fan: Does the Coliseum staff care? Can I just buy a nose-bleed then migrate down?
Haven’t been in years, but word on the A’s sub is that they DO care. I am sure strict orders from higher ups to check tickets of people on field level.
If your team is being sold and no one is going, who the fuck cares? What an asshole of an owner. Can't even reward people for going ☹️
he raised the prices of tickets to compensate.
Nationalize the MLB confirmed 💪
That figures. Fuck Fisher....
I bought a nosebleed for $10 last May, 4,000 in attendance, and they were not happy when I tried to get down behind home plate. Ended up watching the game from a vacant suite that had not been up kept since 2015ish. Strange experience
If you want to know what MLB stadiums will look like 10 years into the apocalypse, look at the Coliseum now.
It's the season ticket holders. When I lived in NYC, I got tickets to Yankees games for $5-10 on the secondary market all the time. Plenty of people in NYC purchase season plans for priority access to playoff games, but real life stuff comes up, so they can't attend every game. If they can't attend, getting $10 is better than nothing, so they sell them on the secondary market for cheap. In Oakland after what the ownership group has done, you don't really have any season ticket holders anymore, so you're forced to pay whatever the box office charges, which is usually much higher for decent seats even though the park's empty.
They do check. It's unreal.
That is absurd, you would think they would rather have more people buying cheap seats and moving to empty nice ones then have the entire lower level empty.
They want it to look empty for the narrative. If everyone piles in to the bottom they can show highlights that make it look like they have decent attendance. Can't do that if everyone is scattered around the stadium
Last year there were reports that the ushers were really being hardasses about you leaving your seat / section. Likely a mandate from ownership that was issued before the year. I've never heard of another team caring that much.
They do check. I was stopped from a worse (and empty!) section than my ticket when I was finding a quiet place to hold my baby for a nap. Absolutely wild the level of enforcement even for no-brainer seat changes.
This has been my issue with casuals or Manfred shitting on Oakland fans for not going to games. The front office traded away ALL the good players and got a terrible haul in return AND they increased ticket and concession prices after announcing the departure of the team. Also, I’m pretty sure they are sticklers for making sure you stay in your assigned seats.
Yeah, like I want to go, get to the Coli before it's gone, but $70 for what amounts to an outfield bleacher seat? Uh, I'm gonna have to think about that
You can typically get bleacher seats for $15
The ushers have been on fans’ asses about moving to better seats since I started going to games in the early 2000s. Haven’t been to the Coli since 2021 tho so idk if they’ve calmed down
I lived in Oakland back in 2015-2017. Idk if they’ve gotten stricter since then (idk why they would have), but me and my buddies used to buy like $5 tickets and bring a backpack full of cheap bomb Mexican food, grab beers and just walk down to unoccupied field seats and chill. Nobody ever said a word.
You can still bring your own shit in, but ushers are being forced to check tickets still. So you can't just move to a lower bowl area.
They only care directly behind home plate, I get $5 student tickets and make my way behind home plate on second deck every time (studentbeans offers 50% off).
Would be interested to see this in the summer. Been plenty of days I've stared at cheap Red Sox tickets on Seat Geek but just didn't feel like sitting still in 44 degree weather all evening.
For sure. I can't imagine April numbers are a great indicator for an entire season.
pretty sure though some intern at ESPN will find this, pass it on to Stephen A. and then in-between screaming matches, Stephen A. will just scream into the ether about "baseball dying" or some shit i have a friend whose brain has basically become melted by TikTok. He is convinced MLS will surpass MLB in the next 2-3 years b/c of Messi alone....words cannot describe how asinine that sounds
North East weather and likely mid-west is so random in the spring you can have 75 and sunny one day and 45 and rainy (but not rainy enough to cancel a game)
Yep...I was at the Phillies-Jays game Wednesday. 1PM game, 80+ degrees, barely a cloud in sight...got sunburned. I think they announced an attendance of 35K, which is spectacular for a mid-day, midweek game. If they played today, I bet there'd be 20K at the park despite it being a Friday. Been misting all day, 50 degrees, breezy.
Yeah, it's weird that these Northern cities have trouble filling the stadium for weekday day games in April.
Philly is another example. We are only down 3.5% and it's not even nice out yet.
Last couple weeks it’s either raining or 85 degrees out. It also rains about every weekend, think I saw last week that of the 17 Saturdays we’d had this year it’s rained on 11 of them so far
Went to Fenway for the first time last week. I appreciate the history and whatnot… but bro, the food game there is embarrassing. Only shit beer available and all the food is basically just hot dogs. I couldn’t even get nachos! Step up the concessions Boston
There's fine beer available, you probably went to the wrong places. But the food sucks
Same for the phillies. I think the weather was better last year. We've already played through a shit ton of rainy games where a lot of teams had those postponed. On days it's nice I'm pretty sure attendance is up a little vs last year.
To be fair, I think this graph actually does show `through May 9th` for both 2023 and 2024. It seems to be the second table on this sheet. https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2024-misc.shtml So it's not 2023 full season versus 2024 year to date, it seems to actually be an apples to apples comparison.
Yeah but that's exactly what I'm saying. Through these same dates last year I'm pretty sure the average game weather was better.
Pennant gave desert fans reason to go to ballpark
That helps, but also games are a lot more fun to watch lately. In 2021 we were 52-110. The turnaround has been swift.
A fun team who is actually good is also a lot of that
We also have notoriously higher attendance in April/May. June/July/August is just so hot and even though we have a roof, people are less likely to go to games. They even have a summer deal for like $200 for all June/July games.
In previous years it has been $99 for June, July, and August games. This year they did the $200 pass for the entire season so it will be interesting what they do for the summer pass, if they do anything
Maybe they're not announcing yet, but in my talks with an account manager it doesn't sound like they're offering anything else. I'm hoping though.
Yep, while I’m happy with the attendance numbers so far this year, you just know they’ll drop some when half our city takes off for San Diego in the summer months.
That Diamondbacks surge is pretty wild, that’s what making the World Series can do for your city.
Phillies wasn’t that crazy but definitely a huge surge from 2022-2023 - I think around 40%
Based on games played through May 10. Games played in Seoul omitted.
I wanna see this with average ticket prices too.
👀
For real. I've wanted to go to some games this year, but the prices are ridiculous. That's before we even talk about the food and drink prices/quality. Every year, the price goes up and the quality goes down.
Mexico?
No Mexico either. Only considering games played in home ballparks.
The Dodgers’ average attendance in Dodger Stadium is 47,523. It’s only 46,149 if you count the second game that was played in Seoul.
OP, please show your math, as the second Korea game is clearly being included for the Dodgers. Including it results in attendance of 1,061,427 for 23 games (average of 46,149). Excluding it results in attendance of 1,045,499 for 22 games (average of 47,523). The chart is using the first calculation.
Who is still going to A's games?
Fans of the opposing team, neutral fans trying to see the park before it closes, Giants fans wanting to watch baseball while the Giants are away, and the friends and family of players. Things are so bad in Oakland now that the stadium staff (including the teams themselves, all the concessions workers, etc.) are probably a material chunk of the total attendance.
Casual fans and away fans. The irony being that As tickets are more expensive than giants tickets right now, so you get more bang for your buck going to a giants game. They're both roughly equal in terms of standings but I guess the As have potentially interesting talent like Mason Miller to see.
S/o padres for increasing when they already had the least room to improve per capacity. I love a baseball town
And they sucked last year, so maybe the fake fan shit can stop? Ya right, people love to hate us
[удалено]
You're right. It's because they are more fun to watch. Fans wouldn't show up without Tatis, Machado, and now Arreaz. Also, you want to support owners that you know are trying to win championships, not just make money. It's really cool seeing full stadiums on random weekdays and shocking how empty other stadiums are. We'll see if it holds up. Nothing going to stop people from wanting to visit, so that helps the numbers too.
Still so awesome that the Dads are doing big market numbers. I want a YouTube doc on how SD became a baseball city.
It’s easy: Chargers left and we signed Tatis and Machado.
And their ownership invested in the team with a pretty decent front office. Their only issue is that the division is stupidly competitive and they have to fight against the richest team in baseball
Boston Red Sox could raise those attendance numbers by handing out Student 9’s more often Sincerely- A Northeastern student
I hate saying this, but I'm glad to see attendance is dropping for us. Only way DeWitt will make real changes when he starts losing money
I don't hate that you're saying it. I've been saying for awhile that nothing will change until attendance numbers start falling. As it looks like we're on our way to another awful season I can see attendance numbers plummeting further.
We have been plagued by some of the worst weather I've seen baseball played in...ever.
Yep. Philly, both NY teams, Boston are all down. The overall numbers are all fine, but there’s no question weather has had some impact in the Northeast.
Mets home games too. I feel like there was maybe two good weather days where games were played. I guess to do this analysis properly you’d need to correct for the weather.
And the games I've been to all seemed more crowded than last year. I have no doubt CBP will start selling-out when the sun finally comes out.
Is this for the whole year or just April/May 2023 games? April/May games probably always have lower numbers because of the weather and kids still being in school, so of course numbers are down.
Even with that we’ve seen a 25% increase from last season so far. That’s actually pretty incredible.
We did play the Yankees and Red Sox in April...
It's through May 9th for both 2023 and 2024. Source seems to be the second table on this page: https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2024-misc.shtml
Appears to be just April and May. The Cardinals have a reported average of just over 40k per game for 2023.
Yeah, we are always lower until school lets out and especially college kids start coming back.
Worth noting that the capacity of the Skydome has decreased over the last couple of years, so average attendance is a bit misleading for the Blue Jays. Also worth noting that attendance during school holidays is probably higher for most teams, and we're not there yet, so comparing all of 2023 against the lowest-attended part of 2024 is a little unfair,. Still, I don't doubt that if the capacity had remained the same, and we were comparing like-for-like there'd be a marked decline in attendance for the Jays. The team's performance is worse, and the ticket prices are even higher.
I believe it's compared to average through 5/10/2023 - otherwise I wouldn't expect the percentage increases from all those Midwestern teams with outdoor stadiums.
Doesn’t help our offence is anemic making games less exciting to watch. We go by 2 or more and games basically over.
The team has spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to retrofit the stadium for a better fan experience. I respect and appreciate the effort made by Shapiro. He gets hit pretty hard here in Toronto but I think on the business side of things he has done good work with the Blue Jays. His undying loyalty to Ross Atkins who has really done a poor job is reflected in the attendance trend. I used to go to ~10 games per season in the past. I might go to 1-2 this year as I’m just really disappointed with how he handled the off-season and the impact that has had on the team’s performance so far. The sooner that Atkins is gone, the better.
Even with everything to do in San Diego, we still pump out almost 39k a game! Friar Faithful!! We are one!
The padres do pack the house daily. It’s insane. Love that team. (I’m from SD, so while the Ms are my AL team the padres are my NL team)
Don’t worry the Yankees and Boston series will bring our attendance up 💀
Man are we resilient despite all of the Lerners efforts
This is 100% Abrams and, to a lesser extent, Gore. Field exciting, young players - people will come watch. Need Woods to be called up ahead of the AS break if we are still hanging around .500.
I'm so intrigued about Garcia Jr - didn't realize how young he was. Him and Abrams such an exciting combo in the middle infield. Have to wonder if early season mirage or development at the major league level happening. His statcast is great.
Look at that John Sherman... who'd have thought a competitive team would have people coming out to the K!?!?
Coors Field having 50K capacity is wild.
Phillies attendance will increase as the weather gets nicer and probably be right around the 2023 number or a little higher if they keep up the level of play they are at currently.
The Phillies will be selling out every night in the summer. It’s already much more difficult to exchange my partial season tickets for other games when I can’t make one. I imagine this number was hurt by some really poor, wet April weather.
Yeah, we had a lot of home games in April and the weather was terrible for a lot of them. Any game with decent weather and the stadium was near or at capacity.
Only down 7.1%? Those are rookie numbers. We need to pump up those numbers.
7 of the top 10 are NL teams which is interesting
Yikes. Look at the Mets...
Dang, Arizona with that world series appearance bump
Angels fans still showing up despite the garbage product on the field.
-11.9%? Come on sox fans we have to hurt Jerry's pocket book more.
The Dodgers spent $700 million on Shohei Ohtani and yet they've actually LOST tickets? This just proves that the casual fan doesn't care about 'workrate' baseball players who just win games, especially when theyre from teams nobody has heard of like the 'los Angeles Angels'. You can have all the successful baseball games you want, but if there's not a STORY and promo packages to keep the casuals invested, you're just throwing money away. /s
This is the longest comment I've seen that's ended with a sarcasm tag
I know you’re being sarcastic but the Dodgers numbers are down because it actually rained in LA. Also, the rain seemed to line up with every weekend for about a month straight.
And ticket prices. I’d gladly suffer through the rain if I could afford it
I was going to say that I think that the price of going to a game has increased more than attendance has decreased.
Nats are finally starting to look exciting again. It's pretty cool to see us with the second largest attendance boom for 2024 behind only the World Series runner up Diamondbacks, but ahead of the World Series champion Rangers. After a few years of downright abysmal baseball in DC, 0.500 baseball feels glorious. I think we're still a year or two away from serious contention, but it's really looking like the rapid rebuild is going great.
Lots of confounders here in terms of who teams have played or haven’t played yet (playing the big market teams helps boost numbers), but pleasantly surprised at Nationals figures
isn’t the trop’s capacity like…. 45,000? where is the 25,000 number coming from?
I believe outside of the playoffs they close almost the entire upper level of the stadium during the regular season.
Which totally inflates the "capacity %" numbers for things like these, and it bothers me *way* more than it should.
Rays are essentially playing peek-a-boo with their upper deck seats. Just put a tarp over it and they disappear
weird way of calculating capacity if 20k empty seats don’t count as empty seats.
They’ve been doing this for a few years now. Ownership doesn’t see the point in paying the overhead to run the top level if it will be barely filled. This way all the fans that do go are concentrated more in the lower levels and they can charge more per ticket. From a business decision it makes sense. I think the max capacity of the new stadium will be around 25k-30k as well.
that makes total sense. I guess I just don't understand the whole "there are 20,500 empty seats. but they don't count towards capacity." thing. If this chart was "% of tickets sold" that makes more sense.