Browns saying “no thanks” to trade offers for Josh Gordon
August 23, 2016Kirk Herbstreit picks Ohio State to make playoffs
August 23, 2016Are you kidding me? Another heart-stopping, one-run game for the Cleveland Indians (72-51) as they defeat the Oakland Athletics (53-72), 1-0. The ninth shutout of the season for the Indians leads the American League the same as their overall record does. Carlos Carrasco (8 IP, 0 R, 4 H, 0 BB, 9 SO) was phenomenal (37:2 SO:BB in his last four starts with a 3.14 ERA). Lonnie Chisenhall to Jason Kipnis to Jose Ramirez was the one defensive relay needed to gun down Coco Crisp’s attempt to spark a rally by turning a double into a triple. Carlos Santana provided the only offense needed as he willed a ball just inside the foul post for his career-high 27th home run of the season.
https://vine.co/v/5O5b6WEj62z
Oh, and Andrew Miller made his first appearance after not being needed in the weekend series versus the Toronto Blue Jays. He did not show any rust. (Ed. note: Pay special attention to the final swing. Like he was trying to guard Kyrie out there.)
https://vine.co/v/5O5hZrXhaYF
Best week (plus) of Indians baseball in recent memory
Sunday August 14: LA Angels 4, Cleveland 5
Game Decided: Andrew Miller and Cody Allen perfect seventh, eighth, and ninth innings to preserve lead.
Notable: Five different Indians scored runs (Kipnis, Ramirez, Naquin, Almonte, Perez) and five different Indians had an RBI (Kipnis, Lindor, Napoli, Naquin, Almonte).
Monday August 15: Boston 3, Cleveland 2
Game Decided: With Naquin and Lindor on first and second with no outs in the ninth, Craig Kimbrel retires Carlos Santana, Jason Kipnis, and Abraham Almonte.
Notable: In the third inning, Travis Shaw was safe at first on a strikeout/wild pitch and advanced to second on another Josh Tomlin wild pitch. Almonte ended the madness by throwing Shaw out at home plate (from right field).
Tuesday August 16: Chi-Sox 1, Cleveland 3
Game Decided: Andrew Miller and Cody Allen perfect seventh, eighth, and ninth innings to preserve lead.1
Notable: Corey Kluber gave up one run in seven innings. Since July 8; 55.2 IP, 1.78 ERA, 43 H, 15 BB, 57 SO
Wednesday August 17: Chi-Sox 10, Cleveland 7
Game Decided: With two-on and tying run at the plate, Rajai Davis strikes out and Brandon Guyer grounds out against David Robertson.
Notable: Cody Allen implodes by giving up five runs in ninth, though much due to bad luck defense. Two-run lead becomes three-run deficit.
Thursday August 18: Chi-Sox 4, Cleveland 5
Game Decided: Abraham Almonte doubled, then advanced on a passed ball to third base. After the passed ball (1-0 count), Tyler Naquin pinch-hit for Roberto Perez and hit a walk-off sacrifice fly.
Notable: Tribe pulls a picket-fence game by scoring exactly one run in each of the last five innings.
Friday August 19: Toronto 2, Cleveland 3
Game Decided: Jose Ramirez and Tyler Naquin hit back-to-back solo homeruns to walk off with the win. Naquin’s was an inside-the-park homerun.
Notable: Trevor Bauer versus Blue Jays in 2016; 13 IP, 1.38 ERA, 7 H, 5 BB, 16 SO
https://vine.co/v/5MtBlAtK65P
Saturday August 20: Toronto 6, Cleveland 5
Game Decided: Osuna redeems himself by retiring Jose Ramirez, Lonnie Chisenhall, and Tyler Naquin in a 1-2-3 ninth inning.
Notable: Five-run fourth inning capped with Lonnie Chisenhall three-run home run to tie the game.
Sunday August 21: Toronto 2, Cleveland 3
Game Decided: Jose Ramirez two-run home run in the eighth. Cody Allen strikes out two, walks two, and induces Russell Martin lineout.
Notable: Mike Clevinger strikes out Edwin Encarnacion with bases loaded in seventh inning.
Why it matters
The method with which kids develop into baseball fans is largely fluid and depends on so many different things. Some have parents who are season ticket holders, and baseball becomes a normal part of their summer routine.2 Some go to games less regularly, but the fond childhood memories create a bond to the team. Maybe a person finds baseball later in life and simply roots for the local ballclub.
But, how does a kid who lives 1,400 miles away develop into a fan of the Cleveland Indians? And, should a parent even want their child to root for a team which requires a nearly four-hour drive to watch live?3
https://vine.co/v/5MtBlAtK65P
These are the questions a departed Northcoast native must wrestle with in the formative years of their kids even if the answer comes about naturally. There are hints sprinkled throughout their childhood even before you are sure how much they care. Their Indians shirt gets worn within the coveted normal rotation. A new puppy gets named Brantley. A gift Indians flag for the office is taken and hung up in a bedroom instead. Excitement to use the same Jaeger J-Bands and Driveline Plyocare balls to train that the team does. The number 24 requested on a football jersey because of the new guy.
Or simply, when asked by someone of their favorite baseball team, they respond “the Indians! And, uh well, the Angels for mommy but they aren’t very good.”4 Hey, given the choice, kids do tend to be frontrunners as it is more fun to see their cheering pay off with a victory and children live through their visceral reactions.5 So it is important that the Indians have won more games than they have lost during the entire tenure of their fanhood.
Even more impactful are weeks such as this last one. There aren’t many stretches of games with tense finishes as the Indians have experienced since Saturday August 13, which was the last time a Tribe game wasn’t decided in the ninth inning.6 A tense game makes for a more tuned in youngster, especially when the recent memories are of late game-winning hits, dog piles at home plate, and gatorade showers.
https://vine.co/v/5hwQmBVIYKA
Coming home from football practice with my eldest on Thursday, there was a decision to make. Either listen to Tom Hamilton potentially call the end of the game or wait until we got home and start the game from the beginning as the kids got ready for bed. The decision was made by my son who wanted to check in on how the Indians were doing. He was in bed on Wednesday as Allen gave up five runs and the win, so he wanted to ensure he didn’t miss anything this time.
The Tribe was down 4-2 in the seventh inning as Hamilton’s voice filled the car. By the time we pulled into the driveway, Almonte and Davis each doubled to cut the deficit to a single run. Hurriedly, he showered and changed as the game transitioned to the television and the rest of the family joined us. He arrived in plenty of time to see Jose Ramirez do what Jose Ramirez does as he hit an RBI single into right field to score Napoli. The drama continued as Miller blazed through the top of the ninth and Almonte doubled, then advanced to third on a passed ball. As Naquin’s sacrifice fly flew high into the air, the family commenced in “waking up the neighbors” with shouts of glee.
As Naquin’s sacrifice fly flew high into the air, the family commenced in “waking up the neighbors” with shouts of glee.
Both teams wanted the game. Toronto and Cleveland are likely October contestants and the winner would hold the important tiebreaker for home field advantage should the teams meet. The game was tense. The players were tense. It is in these moments that a player can rise up to the moment or crack under the pressure. It would be Bauer who won the game for the Indians without ever entering the game.
Lindor would be at the plate for the games most decisive moment. That instant came when Lindor swung wildly at a pitch, missing it, and flinging his bat into the dugout where Michael Martinez and Trevor Bauer needed to dive to the infield grass to avoid being struck. Bauer sprawled out on the grass looked to Lindor and threw his hands up. Unsatisfied with the response, he ensured Lindor saw him as he did it again with a smile. Lindor cracked up, pointed to his eyes and back at Bauer. I see you. Lindor then blooped for a hit and Ramirez hit the game-deciding home run in the next at bat.
“Hey, remember when you told the joke about Obi Wan and Luke Skywalker at the Chinese restaurant?” my eldest said. “It really helped our pitcher laugh, relax and he struck that guy out.8 That was the same. They relaxed, so they won.”
My kids were going to grow up Indians fans because I love the team, especially this particular group of great characters. Watching the games is more about bonding with them and the conversations we have as a result of watching the games than it has anything to do with the team itself. Still, they have to buy-in on watching those games in order to have those conversations. The 2016 Cleveland Indians are making that an easy sell. Thanks Tribe.
https://vine.co/v/5hwxYeAxOaZ
Hook ’em Aggies?
Tyler Naquin scores the first walk-off inside-the-park home run in Indians franchise history since 1916 and flashes a hand gesture afterwards to indicate he was quite excited with the feat. WFNY’s Craig Lyndall and many others within MLB are covering for Naquin stating the symbol means Rock On. Naquin, however, is from Texas. The gesture has a well-known meaning within state borders as it is the official designation for Hook ’em Horns to show support for the University of Texas-Austin. Normally, that would not be a cause for consternation except that Naquin is a Texas A&M Aggie alum. The same university that shows their disdain for all things U-Tx to the extent of putting disparaging remarks about the Longhorns in their own fight song.
https://vine.co/v/5Mp2mXqvuMi
The good thing is that Tyler’s stick together. Cincinnati Reds outfielder (and former Cleveland Indian) Tyler Holt pitched a perfect inning on Monday afternoon without throwing a pitch topping 70 miles per hour. And, he used the same hand gesture, which obviously is some type of mechanism people with the name Tyler use to indicate awesomeness. Scandal avoided.
Our main man, @ItsTHoltBaby, is on to pitch the 9th for the #Reds. pic.twitter.com/RTNfxu96YE
— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) August 22, 2016
- Note: this line is not a copy & paste error. [↩]
- Hat-tip to Craig Lyndall, TD Dery, and the others who support the Indians for generations. [↩]
- MLB needs to expand to Montreal and San Antonio. Even numbered teams in the AL and NL just makes so much more sense than the current 15-team arrangement. [↩]
- The Houston Astros can thank their greedy selves that they do not respond with the Astros. Both were fans of the team when they were young but it is impossible to watch live Astros games in Austin due to secondary market rights and the inability to put them on an accessible station. They cannot watch, so they do not care about them. [↩]
- Yes, many adults do too, but we aren’t diving into social media interactions today. [↩]
- One of the teams had at least the tieing run at the plate in the ninth inning every game since the Indians beat the Angels 5-1. [↩]
- The only issue is that I am an idiot with the application. The brackets had 45 degree holes for the screws, which I did not account for when I put the anchor bolts into the wall. Some frustration and broken bolts later. The problem is the anchors require the bolts be put in straight. If you put them in at 45 degrees, they put undo stress on the bolt and any amount of weight on the bookshelf from, say, books snaps the bolt. I was able to figure out how to anchor the shelf directly through the backing, while using the brackets just for support. [↩]
- Luke was trying to use chopsticks but couldn’t pick up the rice. Obi Wan said ‘Luke, use the Fork!’ [↩]
80 Comments
The guy who uses one of the most expensive nights of the year to determine the “average” has the audacity to call someone’s argument absurd?
I’ve explained this many times here before. If price is such an important factor, then people would flock to lower priced nights, yes? The Indians have those. The Indians have a lot of those. They get the smallest crowds of the year on the nights the prices are lowest. That’s because price isn’t the determining factor. The fans want other things. They want a team leading the division from start to finish. They want cheap meat-flavored sticks. They want big flashy explosions after the game. The Indians sell more tickets when they have those things. And sometimes, like last weekend, the opposing team’s fans come and buy a lot of tickets too, and price doesn’t seem to be the determining factor for them either.
Shall we discuss audacity? You make bald-assertions and then cite them as facts. I have never heard anyone say, “I’d go to more games if there were ‘big flashy explosions'”, I have never heard anyone say “I’d go to more games if they were in first place forever and always”. Sorry if that is what would get you down there but when you ask people why they don’t go, guess what? It is ALWAYS PRICE.
I only buy the $4 beers, and I have seen the $3 hot dogs and sodas. All those numbers are accurate, and represent the cheap option, what those actually looking to save a few bucks would get. The issue seems to be that people want the luxuries at the discount rates.
This reminds of a case study done of a popular big box store. They received numerous complaints about the stands at the end of aisles, as they “cluttered up the store”. So despite the items in these stands selling well, they listened to the customers and removed the stands in some stores. They found that the sales of these stand items dropped immensely when they were no longer easily available, and there was no difference for the items that always remained in the aisles. They brought back the stands, and people went back to buying things from them more frequently.
The point of the story? Sometimes, even a lot of times, customers are pretty bad at describing what they actually want. How they vote with their wallet is what you should be paying attention to. And Indians fans vote with their wallet by not going to cheap games in April and May, but by going to games with fireworks and dollar dogs in July and August. They vote by not going to see a 92 win wild card team, but selling out when they are 7 games up in August.
Never spent less than $300 taking a family of four to an Indians game in the last 15 years. And the $300 is a cheap.
RTA is a complete joke. I’ve taken it from the airport once, had to pay for airport parking and then 1 hour and 15 minutes to the game. But got to know the drivers well as they stopped the train to talk to each other across the tracks for 5 minutes.
$10 parking? Ha! $35 last time I was there, and that was the cheap lot across from the $40 one.
$10 can of Labatt is a luxury?
Nice piece Bode. My two sons are older, but they grew up in the Charlotte market. They laugh at me cheering for the Browns, as they clamor to watch the Panthers play. And I don’t blame them.
Baseball is a lot more complicated. They both are fans of the Indians and Rangers (Mom’s team) with son No 1 being a bigger Indians fan than son No 2. Son No 1 just left for first year of uni. After Naquin’s walk off, i went over to the phone to text him “Please tell me you just saw that”. And on my phone was a text from him “please tell me that you just saw that”….
<<fe.. ★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★✫★★::::::!pt171f:….,…..
Not sure when Fortune took the ticket prices & w/ variable pricing it does matter. Let’s reverse engineer it.
I parked for $20 across the street when I was in town this summer though it was a weekday (cheaper parking a block away for $10). GLB was $7.50, cheap domestic $6.
Even going cheap, $6 (x2) + $4.75 (x2) + $10 = $31.50
They are saying average price of ticket is ~$46/2 = $23?
OK, yeah, I agree. Even before season when there were plenty of cheaper face value seats that seems low. Easily could do it for that price, but hard to say that is average (we paid $25/each including fees per ticket in our customary spot – which is now the seats in front of the RF District).
Found more details on where Fortune pulled it from. They took “average night at a ballpark” rather than “average cost at a ballpark” which is why the ticket price discrepancy is there.
The beer and hot dog prices they quote are different though. Is there $4 beer at the ballpark somewhere?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gobankingrates/most-and-least-expensive_b_9613010.html
Two tickets: $50.40
Two hot dogs: $6
Two beers: $8
Parking: $12
Located in downtown Cleveland, Progressive Field seating is among the roomiest and
most comfortable because of the stadium’s wide aisles. Seats also are
slightly more expensive than most, costing an average of $25.20 each per
game for cheaper season tickets. Other costs to watch the Cleveland
Indians at their home stadium are on the lower end, however, including
beers at just $4 each ― the lowest price of any ballpark.
Hey now, writing to both of y’all here. Let’s be careful. Good debate is all well and good but let’s not get upset at each other. Thanks.
(added so Disqus will let me post same comment)
Hey now, writing to both of y’all here. Let’s be careful. Good debate is
all well and good but let’s not get upset at each other. Thanks.
main determining factor is weekend versus weekday. the Indians put their best promotions on those days in order to increase demand a tick more because it helps the overall net more.
weekdays are a tough sell and promotions have not shown to help as much on them either.
Houston Astros had a promotion (before they were good again) that sold tickets for $25 (including fees) that included a hot dog, chips, and a soft drink. Bought them on T-shirt promotion day, got each kid a hat at the ballpark ($12/each for youth) and got out of there w/ a family of 5 (at the time) for just a shade under $175.
Those are the types of promotions the Indians should be doing on weekdays in summers to get more families into the ballpark (required minimum of 4 tickets).
love that
And some unexpectedly good performances from a few guys as well, but that seems to always be an ingredient of a great season for any team. It’s weird how a season can take on a life of its own that way, with guys having a whole year of unexpected performance shift instead of regressing to statistical probabilities. It happens in both directions, too.
Guessing it is a weekday versus weekend thing there.
I replaced the feature image on this post with the gutter shelves. Or at least a couple of them (put them in the kid’s room too, these are the hallway ones).
I wouldn’t bet on it with the three teams in the AL east playing pretty well, but the Tigers are technically within reach of the wildcard, especially if their pitching continues to do fairly well unlike the beginning of the season. Time is definitely short, though. Feels like the Indians from last year though. Too little too late, and just too many things went wrong.
Side note: While it looks unlikely for multiple reasons, how amazing would it be for the Indians to face the Tigers in the first round?
I would love to face the Tigers in the ALDS
This is interesting though is it what the customers want or what they do? In other words, are people grabbing those items because they really want/need them or is having them in those spots persuading them to impulse buy?
I think there’s a big difference between affordability to attend a game and affordability of season tickets. I live far enough away that attending more than a few games per season is unrealistic, but I guess I don’t think of full-season ticket packages for a “real seat” as something regular joes can afford to do so it doesn’t violate my expectations that it might cost $6-7k. I don’t think $58.85 for two people to have a night out is expensive though, frankly. I wouldn’t blink about spending that on dinner out with my wife, and if we lived within 30 minutes or so of the ballpark I’m sure we’d decide to spend it there sometimes. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’d do it 81 times in 6 months, though. I know that’s the cheapest example, but it’s relative to volume anyway. I’ll typically spring for better seats and fancier food and spend closer to $100 for my wife and I to go to a game, but I only do it 4-5 times per season.
The standing-room and bleachers offer particular value for Indians games, but in general, yes, I always see the cheap seats less full than the expensive ones. The lower deck is always more full than the upper deck, the $8 upper reserved seats in right field were so unpopular the Indians tore them out, and the density of fans always thins as you get further from home plate. (but is high again at The Corner, which was a smart move by the Indians)
It’s not that price doesn’t matter – it’s that perceived value matters more, and what constitutes high prices and/or high value varies from fan to fan. When people say they don’t go because it’s too expensive, what they really mean is that they don’t go because it’s not worth that price to them, and that’s much more complicated than just the price being too high, especially when the entry price is much lower than what one could call “unaffordable.”
I guess I don’t see much difference between the impulse buy and the want, the difference being that people may just not know they want it yet. Need is a different story, though. And the goal of the store, or the Indians, is to provide people what they want, whether they know or admit it.
Oh absolutely. Going to a game on the weekend is a higher priority than price for a lot of fans as well. I don’t mean to say otherwise, and in fact, that’s what I’m trying to get at.
Welcome to Cleveland, where we subsidize our billionaires playthings, but can’t provide competent public transit. Don’t disagree that RTA is frustrating, I’ve used it many times myself, specifically that airport trip. Just pointing out that the option for people who actually want to save money have.
Do people not know about the parking pass you can get from the team?
But you’re not making price the primary factor. You’re choosing luxuries and comforts that go beyond the basics.
Yes. It’s not a required part of the payment to get into a game. It’s not even the cheapest beer on the menu.
Great discussion! Guess we will have to agree to disagree on this one 🙂
(Just read all the comments and picked this one to reply to)