A Disturbing Situation
May 5, 2012Indians will use new roster rule to add Zach McAllister
May 5, 2012The Tribe is in first place, the Texas Rangers (only the two-time defending AL Champions) are in town for the weekend and, as an added bonus, the weather doesn’t suck.
Jeanmar Gomez went 7 strong innings, Shin-Soo Choo and Jack Hannahan each hit a home run and Johnny Damon somehow had a 2-run triple and the first place Cleveland Indians beat the first place Texas Rangers 6-3. Chris Perez notched his 10th save.
So of course, with 16,147 fans in attendance, the stadium was less than half full.
Makes sense.
I hate that the Tribe’s attendance (or lack thereof) continues to be a story, but one can’t help but notice it. Considering where they were in the 90s, seeing Cleveland average 14,000 per home game (and having that be an improvement!) is fairly depressing.
It kills me that this team doesn’t draw as well as it should. But what do you blame? When the Tribe was selling out, the team (and the economy) was great, the stadium was new, the Cavs stunk and the Browns were on hiatus. Baseball was the only game in town and the Indians took advantage of it.
But now? There’s a whole host of issues. The economy stinks, the Browns are back (WHO WANTS TO TALK ABOUT COLT McCOY’S DAD?!), the Cavs have been relevant for over a decade and fans don’t trust the Dolans and/or baseball’s salary structure.
The Dolans take a lot of flack and, for the most part, deservedly so. You can’t deny that they’re cheap. The fact that Tribe fans are legitimately excited for 38-year old Johnny Damon (and should be!) says a lot about Cleveland’s owners (and that their other offseason signings were Derek Lowe and Grady Sizemore says even more). I have a hard time blaming fans for not getting behind these owners.
But I can only blame the Dolans for so much. Are they cheap? Sure. But they’ve also been unlucky. I thought they made the right move when they tore down the Thome-era teams to rebuild with the CC Sabathia/Victor Martinez/Grady Sizemore team. And they rebuilt well; they sold off aging vets for prospects that turned into everyday players. The plan worked.
What hurts is that version of the Tribe only got one shot at the playoffs before they were forced to sell off the veterans again. And as much as that sucks, I can’t blame the Dolans for not paying CC or Cliff Lee over $100 million. To me, this is a baseball issue. Again, the Indians did what a small market should’ve done; they traded old vets for prospects, rebuilt the team around a new core of players. They did everything right (except add a RH bat), but due to the economics of baseball (and the city of Cleveland), the Dolans legitimately couldn’t pay all of their talent.
What made things worse was the talent the Tribe kept around couldn’t stay healthy. Sure, they had to sell off Sabathia and Lee, but the guys they decided to pay (Travis Hafner, Grady Sizemore and Jake Westbrook) could never stay on the field. For a team with such a small margin for error, having what little money was spent stuck on the disabled list hurts doubly so. Even now, when the Indians make a ‘Win Now’ move to acquire Ubaldo Jimenez, he almost immediately implodes.
Does that excuse them for the small payroll? No. But at the same time, last season the Indians had the lowest per game attendance in the Majors. It’s a chicken vs egg scenario, will the fans show up when the Tribe spends (re: wins) or will the Tribe spend when the fans show up? I dunno.
And it’s too bad. This Tribe team is fun and if you can’t get excited about Jason Kipnis, you shouldn’t be a fan of sports. I fully believe that if this team starts winning (and they ARE in first place), the fans will show up.
At least I hope so.
The second game of their three-game series with Rangers starts at 7:05 tonight, Derek Lowe will start for the Tribe and Ohio native Derek Holland will start for Texas.
45 Comments
No sir. I spend all my time b——- about how the browns draft players too high. J/K
This team is just really fun right now. Can you imagine if Choo, Masterson and Ubaldo figure things out along with no one getting injured?
Is Hannahan really going to keep this up? Kipnis? Are you for real? Santana starting to show his ability behind the plate and sure can handle our staff. Rolltribe!
As positive as I’m feeling right now when this season is over and we end up far in the playoffs but ultimately loose I’ll blame the FO for not adding that RH power bat.
Fans won’t support a first place team because they don’t think Dolan is doing enough to build a first place team. The logic is flawed.
it seems to me that it’s too early to get too concered about the attendance. the weather hasn’t helped and school is still in session. and certainly if we keep winning and getting great output from some of the more marketable type guys (i.e Kipnis, Chris Perez, Pestano, Damon, etc) then I expect there to be a dramatic influx in attendance numbers as the season goes along. but once school is out, hopefully the youth is back in the stands enjoying some good summer baseball.
Its a football town, Dolan is just a convenient excuse. Even in 07 the attendance kinda stunk. Yet the Browns are sold out for every home game, and they havent won a playoff game since Belichick was their head coach. If it was all about supporting a winner, The Factory of Sadness would be half full every week. I mean if Mark Cuban bought the team attendance would probably improve, slightly. But for the most part it would be more of the same, small crowds in April/May with people jumping on the bandwagon in July/August if the team is contending. Is what it is.
Football/Baseball is apples oranges. If the Indians only played 8 home games a year every single one would be sold out guaranteed. If the Browns played 81 homes games loosing like 60 of them they would have even lower attendance then the Indians. That is all there is to it.
Baseball and football cannot be compared to each other in attendance because of the supply/demand thing.
If comparing the teams marketing/talking to the fans the Indians are way better at it than the Browns, IMO anyways.
absolutely
It’s still just May 5 AND we saw this show a year ago. When you factor in what the Indians have said and what they’ve done along with seeing this a year ago I can understand why alot of people aren’t exactly HYPED. Oh and it’s still just May 5th.
Factor in the Browns and the post-draft high wearing off and maybe a little Cavaliers preparation for the draft lottery and it’s no wonder the Indians are overlooked. It won’t change until they actually accomplish something. An accomplishment is making the playoffs, winning the division or the whole thing. A good season isn’t an accomplishment, at least to me. I have higher standards.
The best part of the Indians organization is their marketing. It’s been that way for awhile. If the Browns could ever figure that out they’d have even more Kool-Aiders but I don’t think it’ll happen.
The bad attendance doesn’t frustrate me – it is the fact that it is SO MUCH worse than every other team. Tribe is last in attendance by 6,000.
Other teams have worse payrolls, worse records and worse weather. I get why people don’t show – just not why it is so much worse relative to other teams.
My brother-in-law, originally from Sandusky, is now living right outside of Fort Worth, about a twenty minute drive to the Rangers’ ballpark. He was watching the game last night, and a friend of his, who knows my brother-in-law’s roots, texted him and asked why no one watches baseball in Cleveland.
Ugh.
I wish I lived closer to Cleveland, but 2.5 hours is just far enough away to keep me from going up more frequently than I do. I went up about a half-dozen times last year, and once school is out, we’ll probably attend that many again. I love going to The Jake (sorry, it’ll always be that to me) and I can’t wait to go watch the first-place Tribe! And I remember Manny last year calling Kipnis a “dirtbag”. I LOVE that.
I wish I lived closer too…being in Southern California, I only get a good chance to see them for one series this year…
Same thing happened last year. Once summer hit and the weather got nice, the attendance jumped quite a bit.
I think between the disdain of the fans for Dolan and the flame out of last years team who was in first for most of the spring the fans don’t believe the team has enough talent to sustain winning through the post season. The team will have to go to a world series before the fans get onboard again (only 1/2 joking). If they prove winning isn’t a fluke the fans will come.
I would argue that the Indians rebuild had two shots at a title. Stupid Set McClung…
I live 550 miles away, I barely make more than minimum wage and I’ve still managed to make it to two Indians games this year (would have been three if the White Sox game hadn’t been snowed out). No excuses, Cleveland. You’ve finally got a winning team, go and show your support.
I don’t have a problem with the Dolans, but I do have a problem with MLB. Last year I started to get over the frustrations and disaffected feelings that culminated in the Lee/Sabathia business. Starting May 10th my schedule opens up and I’ll be attending a game weekly, and I’m pretty enthused about it.
I think it’s just hard to get back into baseball for folks. Lebron to a certain extent is out of sight out of mind, and there was at least contention and some token changes to the way the NBA does business as a result of The Decision. MLB is exactly the same as it was in 2009. It’s an anchor on my enthusiasm.
Related, sports radio is failing Indians fans. The last time I tuned in the only thing being said about the Indians is how they couldn’t talk about them because Seneca Wallace said two sentences and because of that they have to talk about the draft for three hours. I guess there just aren’t enough meatheads watching baseball with the mindset that the rest of the city needs to hear their opinion on the radio to fill the switchboards.
that’s a great point.
According to ESPN we were 24th in per game attendance last year-not last…unless I read that wrong.
Except that football and baseball seasons hardly coincide. No one is sitting at home right now saying “I’d like to go to that Indians game tonight but I have to save up my little disposable income for the Browns’ game against the Ravens in October.” The whole “this is a Browns town” excuse is terrible.
Kinda like we were in first place last year in mid-July. Should we all get our hopes up, get disappointed, wash, rinse, repeat?
Yes. This is Cleveland, that’s how it works.
The Dolan’s don’t deserve anywhere near as much clack as they’re getting. They’ve gotten the payroll in the 80-90 M range when they expected to contend. Fans responded with a 9th out of 14 in attendance. How do you expect ownership to take risks on FAs when even if they do work, fans are not likely to show? Only in Cleveland would people put “how much did you spend” above “two first place teams playing on a beautiful night, with fireworks to boot”
ESPN only focuses on New York and Boston. I thought those were the only teams I was supposed to pay attention to (when we are not watching the Chicago or LA teams on Monday/Wednesday/Sunday baseball). Again, not like we are in first place or anything. But hey! How about those last place Red Sox?
In that case I’ll be there, $20 in hand to trade for a hot dog and a bud light
I used to love the Indians and watched them all the time until they imploded the team and replaced them with people I never heard of…this was followed by several years without a playoff run. Now that the team is showing some heart and having a great start to the season I’ve found myself interested in watching them again. I can barely afford to eat so I can’t afford to go to a game yet, but if the team continues to do well the fans will return.
I also wanted to mention that the younger generation in Cleveland has a far greater interest in Basketball and Football then their parents generation had. With the week economy can the fans that remained loyal to the team and sport in general really be expected to purchase tickets and parking for Cavs games, LEMonsters games, Browns games, and Baseball games and still afford to pay their bills? People were willing to run up massive debt on their credit cards in the 90’s, those days are over!
The attendance is an issue, but there’s no point in blaming the fans. Even if the fans were showing up more, it wouldn’t make that huge of a difference. If you had 1 million more fans in a season, which would be about 12k/game more than whatever the current average is, at current average ticket prices you’d be generating… maybe $20M more? That’s not insignificant, but that’s not going to change the basic situation. Which is that the Indians are a mid-market team that cannot afford to put the payroll north of $100M because they don’t make the cable money that other teams do.
The Angels make $150M/year through their deal. The Yankees and Red Sox make at least that much. The Indians make $30M/year. That’s where the difference lies. As long as that’s the case… the Indians will struggle to retain talent when it hits the free agent market. That’s why the Indians won’t be “in” on guys like Prince Fielder, CJ Wilson or Albert Pujols.
When the Royals, Pirates, and all the other doormat franchises actually have a chance to compete (like the worst team in the NFL does every year) then people in those cities will take interest. Why invest our emotions and dollars into a product we are positive will let us down? Baseball will lose popularity until it either contracts and eliminates the small market teams, or institutes a level playing field salary cap system. Neither of those things will happen because baseball people don’t or can’t evolve with the times…so I predict baseball will be a marginal niche sport in 20 years or so.
I know this is more of a general statement about the cost of attending pro sports contests, but you can’t get a family of 4 to a major league baseball game for less than $100 (cheapest seats, parking, food, etc.). That’s a TON of money for someone that takes home around $1,000 every couple of weeks.
Down here in C-Bus, I love going to Clippers games. General admission tickets are $7, they still do ‘dime-a-dog’ night, and parking is $5. I know it’s not the majors, but it’s competitive, it’s a night at the park, and every seat in the house is great. They still rake it in on the beer ($7 for a domestic…sheesh!), but other than that, it’s a great family outing.
“You can’t deny that they’re cheap” … “Are they cheap? Sure.”
Shame on you, Ben for repeating that mindless refrain. The Dolans aren’t gazzilionaire entrepreneurs like the dude in Detroit, and they clearly don’t have the funds to compensate for baseball’s system. But not spending your funds when you should is being cheap. Not having funds to spend does not make one “cheap” any more than a homeless person is too cheap to rent an apartment. Unless you know something about the Dolans’ finances that indicates they’re pocketing profits while cutting basic organizational needs a la Mike Brown and the Bengals, it’s unfair to throw an accusation that implies a moral failing. Blast them for being over their head, about having been taken on the purchase price, for bad business practices, whatever. But enough with that word. That’s not the word you mean.
I know it’s not apples to apples, but I guess I’m just trying to say there are other options for entertaining your family with sports.
For instance, $90 per person a few years back would get me a tower box at Peden Stadium at OU. That included a parking pass and ALL 5 home games. Now…OU’s not OSU, but I think you see where I’m going with this.
Valid point, its not an apples to apples comparison.
My point though is that Cleveland, generally speaking, is fanatically loyal to its football team. They run hot and cold with the other 2 acts in town. Dolan is a factor, of course, whenever fans dislike/distrust the owner, attendance will suffer. But if Gilbert bought the Indians (everyones pipe dream) how much of a boost in attendance would you really see? Maybe they would draw 2 million instead of 1.7-1.8, but the boost in attendance would not be so drastic that they would suddenly be able to carry a 130 million dollar payroll like the Tigers do. And many will not be happy until that happens.
The attendance jumps for everybody, so what, we’re still 6000 people/night behind everyone? Fantastic.
I never suggested that the Indians would be in on big name free agents, or able to put out payrolls north of $100 million. All I’m doing is showing how blatantly incorrect the perception of the Dolans is and how generally pathetic the fanbase is.
If the difference between OU and OSU or the Clippers and Indians make no difference to you, then, sure go ahead and support the cost leadership teams.
Also, you can get into Progressive Field for $9/person, and parking is $5. Food is obviously up to you, but they do dollar dog nights, and you can bring in peanuts and water. If the cost is that important to you, you can get 4 people in for under $100 without too much of a stretch.
2015 – lease expires.
fans are making their statement for better or for worse. the Dolans (or more likely new owners) can make theirs then. warning: we may not like the answer.
KC and Pitt don’t have teams in 1st place. Not even early.
The only time you will see the fans start showing up is when they are in a pennant race in September. Look at 2007 people didn’t start showing up until August and September when they saw they had a legit team.
Myself I am not going to waste my money on any of the three worthless Cleveland teams because 1) I am a struggling low wage college grad with a wife and a baby 2) I believe that its a waste of money for 2 $10 bleacher seats, $20 parking ($10 if you want to walk a mile), $9 beer, and $8 for a hot dog and pop. and 3) The Indians marketing strategy is awful, I have seen the same commercial now for the 2nd season. No where around town do you see any type of advertising like you do with the Cavs and even the Browns.
The only time I will be going to a game this year is when I get free tickets. Same with the Browns and the Cavs.
I think for a lot of teams, the answer wouldn’t be favorable, but the Dolans are local and grew up as fans of the team. As long as the team can remain profitable in the long-term, the Dolans aren’t selling or moving anywhere.
Eat home before the game, sit in the bleachers, park for $10 and it’s $50. That’s way under $100.
The Indians, esp with the low cost of Cleveland parking, have one of the cheapest tickets in all of pro sports.
I keep hearing people complain about the parking, and am wondering where people are actually going. The PNC building is 5 minutes away and costs $5. There’s a garage on the corner of 9th and Prospect, that cannot be more than 2 minutes away that cost $10.
And for all the people who say that price is a concern, then don’t try to find a way to cut costs (like eating at home), then the problem lies with you, not the Indians.
And the Indians marketing strategy has put the other two teams in town to shame, its just that you only need to show a picture of a Browns helmet to get people riled up, while the Indians actually have to be creative and try to connect with people.
I agree about the moving anywhere. I think it would be tough to take over your childhood team, and have to move them to a new city. I am not sure how “profitable” they truly are and also a new owner may see the team as an investment (if he is willing to move the team).
remember, the “profitable” factor also includes what other use could be done with that money and last year was among the first that we actually received money back as part of the revenue sharing (we had been too high in the past).
and, the fans are speaking with their wallets (loudest voice they have), which could back the Dolans into a corner where they feel they have to sell.
The Dolans didn’t buy the team to make it profitable though. I know fans like to pretend that the Dolans are squeezing every last dime they can get out of the team, but, really, thats far from the truth.
I guess if fans keep away to the tune of 5,000 less a night than the second to worst draw, they’d have to consider selling, and they’ll deal with years like 2009 where they will lose a good deal of money, but I don’t think, at this point with MLB so flush with cash, that a team with a halfway decent stadium deal will ever be a long-term financial loser.
Where are you people parking for 20 dollars? I’ve never spent more than 5 and more often than not I just find a meter spot after 6pm for free.
I completely agree with you. I went to Saturday nights Rangers game and spent a grand total of $9. Ate before the game and parked around Tower City for free.