MLB Stadium Saga: Oakland/Tampa Bay/Southside

[raysox]

58 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

 

 

2 hours ago, raysox said:

than any of the other 90s expansion teams

 

[TBGKon]

I have to side with @raysox that the first true generation of Rays fans is in the age range of 30-35.  I for one am 32, and was 13 when the Rays began play.  Been a fan ever since the beginning, but when the core group of Rays fans is in their early thirties, theyre just beginning families which will continue to grow.

 

The Lightning are 5 years older than the Rays and are just now beginning to hit their strides.

[The_Admiral]

35 minutes ago, AstroBull21 said:

I have to side with @raysox that the first true generation of Rays fans is in the age range of 30-35.  I for one am 32, and was 13 when the Rays began play.  Been a fan ever since the beginning, but when the core group of Rays fans is in their early thirties, theyre just beginning families which will continue to grow.

Hear this as an excuse for giving taxpayer bailouts to NHL teams

 

35 minutes ago, AstroBull21 said:

The Lightning are 5 years older than the Rays and are just now beginning to hit their strides.

There it is

[Gothamite]

2 hours ago, raysox said:

than any of the other 90s expansion teams

 

[TBGKon]

3 hours ago, AstroBull21 said:

The Lightning are 5 years older than the Rays and are just now beginning to hit their strides.

 

2 hours ago, the admiral said:

There it is

There what is?  I'm not really one of those confrontational people on here but I'm confused as to what you mean.

[Sykotyk]

4 hours ago, AstroBull21 said:

 

There what is?  I'm not really one of those confrontational people on here but I'm confused as to what you mean.

He thinks the announcement of a team instantly creates thousands of diehard fans who will devote their lives and support to the team.

 

[Gothamite]

It usually does.  

 

At the very least, fans come out to a new team if it does well.  But when a team leads its division every day of the season, wins the pennant, goes to the World Series, and still can't draw flies, that says something.

[SFGiants58]

3 hours ago, Gothamite said:

It usually does.  

 

At the very least, fans come out to a new team if it does well.  But when a team leads its division every day of the season, wins the pennant, goes to the World Series, and still can't draw flies, that says something.

 

It seems that you've ignored the key part of Raysox's post:

 

22 hours ago, raysox said:

I grew up with this team and nearly everyone who grew up here is a Rays fan. The fan base is growing. If only someone pointed out it's a location and facility problem, rather than the market being broken.

 

 

 

I know that it may seem tough, but it would be good for us to show a little compassion towards Rays fans. They've spent almost a decade hearing the "they couldn't draw flies, even when they went to the World Series" and "you should lose your team" epithets. The former ignores that it was the first season that the team was worth a damn in the standings. They didn't have the same kind of entrenchement in the area that an older, historically more successful franchise would have (I might also cite poor marketing as a reason for this). The latter is just plain insulting. Put yourself in their shoes, and try to understand why they're sick of people from outside of the area telling them that the team they've poured their heart into should go away.

[Gothamite]

Hey. I'm not the one who started calling out the team for terrible attendance.  Their own players were.

 

I didn't mean to ignore anything - I'm glad to hear that in his experience, the fanbase is growing.  But that isn't reflected in the numbers; the basic fact that their attendance is still pathetic, worst in the majors by a long shot.  Even boosted by an outsize number of games against the Yankees and Red Sox, traditionally two of the larger-drawing clubs.  And no amount of excuses can wish that away.

 

It was never my intention to insult anybody.  And frankly, I'm not sure how anyone could reasonably take that away from my remarks.  I do not doubt that the Tampa Bay area is full of fine people.  I have visited it, and enjoyed myself.  I have also strongly advocated for St. Petersburg to get an MLS franchise, and really hope that comes later this year.   Nor am I a fan of franchise moves, hailing from two cities still bearing the decades-old scars of moves past.

 

@raysox, I am genuinely sorry if you interpreted my remarks as an insult.  I did not intend them as such, and will try to phrase my words better in the past to avoid giving anyone that impression next time.

 

But saying that the area hasn't supported their MLB franchise even in good times is not an insult, it's a statement of fact.  And it's a value-neutral one as well, since there's no moral obligation to patronize a major league baseball club.  We have to be able to discuss those simple facts honestly.

[OnWis97]

23 hours ago, raysox said:

 

Sure if you ignore the fact the Rays still have above average TV ratings

https://www.forbes.com/sites/maurybrown/2016/09/28/here-are-the-2016-mlb-prime-time-television-ratings-for-each-team/2/#7ea293f1791d

 

 

 

 

Most of the stuff I cut out of the post is fairly meaningless (twitter followers, etc.)

 

But if one is to play devil(ray)'s advocate, this TV rating piece may be the thing...granted, this is just one year and I'm not about to search for more history, but this link puts them in the middle of the pack in 2016.  At face value, this indicates interest.  Now, we all know that "support" has to come from attendance as well...but if the TV numbers indicate interest, is it simply an issue of their outrageously sterile ballpark combined with the terrible location I always hear about?  And would a nice ballpark in a better location (is that possible in this large, congested area with some geographic constraints?) solve the problem?

 

As an aside, I was guessing the Twins, losers of 103 games last year, would be very low on that list; it was nice to see them at 12.  I'm 43 and the Twins pre-date my birth by 13 years.  They have sort of reached the point of being an "institution" for all generations in Minnesota.  Perhaps that's why they did OK on TV during the dreadful year they had last season.  Perhaps, this lends something to the point that there are still people in the Bay that did not "grow up" with the Rays in the same way and as time moves on, that will become less of an issue.

 

I'm not really saying the team is (or is not) viable...ultimately, they need to sell more tickets. 

[Sport]

Sorry I can't blame the people of Tampa for not regularly visiting a bad stadium in an out of the way place. All of their problems stem from that fact alone. Their TV ratings tell me there's a fanbase there. I also don't understand why "people who were kids when the team first started are now adult fans with money" is verboten round these parts as if it's been debunked. That line of thinking makes sense. 

 

Baseball is not a commuter sport, not with 81 home dates, many of them during week days/nights. I love going to baseball games, and I've seen the Reds in person 10 times this season, but that's mostly because they're conveniently placed and easy. If they were in the St Pete equivalent of Cincinnati I'd probably have gone to 8 or 9 fewer games. I'm not driving 90 minute round trips to go see my team on a weeknight, especially after I've worked a full day downtown and live on the opposite side of the city. That's the reality for a lot of the Rays fanbase. You add that the stadium is maybe the worst in the majors and it's easy to calculate why they're struggling with attendance. 

 

 

[OnWis97]

2 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

Sorry I can't blame the people of Tampa for not regularly visiting a bad stadium in an out of the way place. All of their problems stem from that fact alone. Their TV ratings tell me there's a fanbase there. I also don't understand why "people who were kids when the team first started are now adult fans with money" is verboten round these parts as if it's been debunked. That line of thinking makes sense. 

 

Baseball is not a commuter sport, not with 81 home dates, many of them during week days/nights. I love going to baseball games, and I've seen the Reds in person10 times this season, but that's mostly because they're conveniently placed and easy. If they were in the St Pete equivalent of Cincinnati I'd probably have gone to 8 or 9 fewer games. I'm not driving 90 minute round trips to go see my team on a weeknight, especially after I've worked a full day downtown and live on the opposite side of the city. That's the reality for a lot of the Rays fanbase. You add that the stadium is maybe the worst in the majors and it's easy to calculate why they're struggling with attendance. 

 

 

I pretty much had to like this post...we both made similar points about TV, ballpark, location, and age of fan base.  Plus we both worked our own teams in.  

However, I'm not convinced that the bold word needs to be there.

[Sport]

We posted similar thoughts at almost the exact same time. High five! Yeah, okay, it is the worst stadium in the bigs. The Lightning seem to have good attendance with a centrally located arena. I don't see why the Rays wouldn't be the same. 

 

I was going to add a hypothetical: You're a disposable income having 35 year old with a couple kids who works in downtown Tampa and lives North of the city. Someone offers you free Rays tickets at 10 am for a 7 pm game. You're a huge Rays fan and so are your kids, but you're faced with this decision: go to the game which requires you to leave your downtown office at five, sit in rush hour traffic, pick up the kids, drive back through rush hour so about an hour there, across a bridge to St Pete, watch a full baseball game, drive 45 minutes back home, get home around 11/11:30, wake up and go to work the next day. Are you going to do all of that or are you just going to say you know just watching on TV at home sounds better? Most of the time I'm not interested in going through that slog just to see a game. 

 

A couple times this year friends have asked if I wanted to go to the Reds game that night and I left work and walked to the stadium. I can tell you right now if I had to do the crosstown shuffle to go to the game I wouldn't have said yes. Good team or not. 

[The_Admiral]

1 hour ago, McCarthy said:

I also don't understand why "people who were kids when the team first started are now adult fans with money" is verboten round these parts as if it's been debunked.

Devils fans have been pushing this for years and I still don't think their season ticket base is where you would expect it to be. 

 

I don't believe on giving up on Tampa for baseball because the TV ratings are still pretty good, certainly not commensurate with the awful attendance. Besides, there's nowhere else to go. I hope they have the money to build a new outdoor park.

[Jer15]

24 minutes ago, the admiral said:

I don't believe on giving up on Tampa for baseball because the TV ratings are still pretty good, certainly not commensurate with the awful attendance. 

Not MLB but, I've been hearing this about the Argos for years and years and a new stadium hasn't helped them.

Obviously different sport, different city, heck, different country. 

I'm just skeptical about that argument.  

[DG_ThenNowForever]

How did sports teams justify bad public investments prior to Field of Dreams?

[dfwabel]

Keep in mind that the four county Tampa Bay area (Hillsborough, Pasco, Pinellas and Hernando) are still seventh in the nation in home foreclosures. When the Rays were in the World Series, they were second. The irony of this thread and moving them to basically the Pacific time zone of the same situation but with drought issues, is humorous to me. 

[The_Admiral]

2 hours ago, mr.negative15 said:

Not MLB but, I've been hearing this about the Argos for years and years and a new stadium hasn't helped them.

Obviously different sport, different city, heck, different country. 

I'm just skeptical about that argument.  

 

You can't have a Canadian league without Toronto. Probably for the best to have a smaller stadium, though.

[IceCap]

On 2017-08-29 at 7:01 AM, Gothamite said:

 

No, they're not.  They're just fans of other teams. 

Go Jays go! 

 

Wait, what were we talking about? 

[Sport]

8 hours ago, the admiral said:

Devils fans have been pushing this for years and I still don't think their season ticket base is where you would expect it to be. 

 

 

Their issues are bigger and more complicated. It doesn't mean it's not true, though, because the entirety of the professional sports model depends on child fans growing up to become adult ticket buyers. That's how it works. I used to a kid who was a fan of the Cincinnati Reds and now I'm an adult who buys tickets to watch the Cincinnati Reds. It's happened in Tampa - The Tampa Bay Lightning have season ticket holders right now who were kids in 1992.

 

not sure why that's regarded as this big myth on this message board.