Just as it was for generations of Americans before me, some of the most cherished moments of my childhood were spent at a ballpark. As a kid, my father took me to countless baseball games at Shea Stadium, just as his father had done with him. In the modern era, baseball has always been around to provide excitement and an escape from reality for its fans. Throughout their history, ball players have been able to pick up a nation in depression, a nation at war - and even a nation in the wake of a deadly attack on its largest city. Legends have been born, becoming immortalized as America's pastime evolved and nearly every American was there to watch.
Riddle me this: The American League's top-seeded team in this year's playoffs, the Tampa Bay Rays, is ranked 22nd in all of baseball when ordered by average attendance. The Phillies edge the Rays by just one game to boast Major League Baseball's best record and also just about double the Rays' average attendance. It doesn't take a genius to know that wins generally translate to more attendance. Of the teams that have a lower attendance rate than the Rays, just two finished the year in third place or better in their divisions. So what is at the root of this paradox?
One possible answer is the price of tickets. Thanks in part to a stalled economy, attendance of baseball games has declined for the third straight year. From 2009-10, attendance is down .5 percent, while ticket prices on average have increased by more than 1.5 percent. An evening at Yankee Stadium will on average run you more than $70, and that's just for a ticket. But of course as the most celebrated team in all of sports, they do lead the Majors in attendance. The AL East-champion Rays, however, are not as blessed when it comes to ticket revenue. Although they offer some of the league's cheapest tickets, it is clear that more people still will head out to the Tropicana Field if prices were lowered. Last week, after some critical remarks were made by Rays players about the lack of support at the ballpark, the organization handed out 20,000 free tickets in an effort to reach out to the Tampa Bay area, offering the opportunity to support a first-place team to fans who otherwise may not have been able to do so.
Supply and demand theory doesn't apply just to fans in New York and Tampa. This summer, as an intern in Washington, D.C., I attended a number of Nationals games for the low cost of $5. Other interns I met were also keen on attending games at such a low cost, even though some of them wouldn't even be able to pick a baseball out of a lineup of sporting equipment. Such low prices are a great way to expose this beautiful game to a potential fan base. When the Mets came to town, I made the trip to Nationals Park three times and spent a whopping $15. A month later when I was home in New York, I made it to one Mets game at Citi Field. Price of admission: $18.
The lesson team owners need to learn is that baseball is not like the NFL. Each team plays 81 games in their home ballpark. Most of these games are played during the week. As a result, not every game is going to sell out, so it certainly doesn't make sense to continue charging an arm and a leg for admission.
To be clear, a drop in attendance does not imply the number of baseball fans is shrinking. The Rays, who have seen success during the past three years that rivals no other time in franchise history, also have been experiencing TV ratings and merchandise sales that are through the roof. Fans in Tampa are content with staying in their air-conditioned homes during the dog days of summer watching one of the best baseball clubs the country has to offer on their HDTVs. And there's nothing wrong with that. Starting today, when the Rays take on the Texas Rangers to open the 2010 playoffs, we will see attendance that will surely rival even that at Yankee Stadium and Citizens Bank Ballpark in Philadelphia.
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