MLB Stadium Saga: Oakland/Tampa Bay/Southside

[PrimalCookie]

Look. I made this thread for discussion about that (pretty trash IMO) article saying the Rays could be moving to Vegas. However, just like every time the Rays come up, the conversation turns into a hatefest with people saying they wish the team would move. I mean, seriously? The Indians, who are World Series contenders, are 24th in the league in attendance. During Game 7 of the WS last year you could hear on the TV the "Go Cubbies Go" chants. No one is using the "even though the team is successful, they aren't drawing well, so they they should leave" argument for them. Also, Montreal, the main place where people are saying the Rays should go, was never a good draw either. The New Expos would have good attendance the first year due to the hype and then it would go back to the normal old 8,000 a year Expos, which the Rays have already outdrawn by over 7,000 (their attendance figures to date are 15,614 - undeniably a bad number but not nearly as bad as the beloved Expos, who according to everyone should come back immediately).

[The_Admiral]

55 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

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.

 

Right, but what about when the formula requires the children of transplanted Pittsburghers and Western New Yorkers to break with who their families like? Those stains don't wash out easy. Raleigh should be crawling with the children of Penguins fans who grew up to be Hurricanes fans. They seem to have grown up to be more Penguins fans. (Which is fine by me because the Penguins are cool.)

[HedleyLamarr]

Penguins fans will disappear once Crosby is done, just like they disappeared when Mario left the ice for good.

[Sport]

1 hour ago, the admiral said:

 

Right, but what about when the formula requires the children of transplanted Pittsburghers and Western New Yorkers to break with who their families like? Those stains don't wash out easy. Raleigh should be crawling with the children of Penguins fans who grew up to be Hurricanes fans. They seem to have grown up to be more Penguins fans. (Which is fine by me because the Penguins are cool.)

 

And once upon a time those Penguins needed a couple generations to build their fanbase into what it is today. Penguins fans have only existed since 1967 (or 2005 depending on what month of the year you ask me) and it wasn't always a pillar of strength nor did it happen overnight. What did a 35 year old Penguins fan with a season ticket used to be? He/she used to be a kid who got hooked on the team in 91. This is what I'm saying. 

 

Those stains do wash out. I can't speak for Raleigh, but I can speak for Columbus where I'm from and my experience, right now, is people in their mid 20's recently out of OSU or OU or Miami or Bowling Green who were the children of Blackhawks and Penguins and Red Wings fans or, most likely, no team, are now Columbus Blue Jackets ticket and merch buyers because we grew up with them. It's very real. I don't get why it's so thoroughly brushed aside as fallacy on this board when the number of successful expansion and relocated franchises operating right now in North American sports proves my point for me. Look at the Tampa Bay Lightning.

 

I just want to talk about why "when the kids grow up" is off the table here. Is it because it didn't/hasn't taken in Phoenix? Man, Phoenix. 

[The_Admiral]

51 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

 

And once upon a time those Penguins needed a couple generations to build their fanbase into what it is today. Penguins fans have only existed since 1967 (or 2005 depending on what month of the year you ask me) and it wasn't always a pillar of strength nor did it happen overnight. What did a 35 year old Penguins fan with a season ticket used to be? He/she used to be a kid who got hooked on the team in 91. This is what I'm saying.

I mean, in a sense you're right, but I've dug my heels in too deep on this argument and I don't really see a viable exit plan for myself here, so I probably kinda have to see this through to the bitter end where I get mod-edited for calling everyone retarded and gay or something.

 

I would say that these more precarious markets also have to deal with new generations of fans feeling less and less bound to local teams. I'm even seeing it around Chicago where there are more and more kids running around in Rodgers, Brady, Manning, or otherwise Not Bears jerseys. Same with the NBA field and the Bulls, which, as a child of the dynasty, is still unthinkable. I think baseball and hockey are a little more inoculated against that sort of globalization for various reasons, but who's to say the inevitable fall of the RSN model doesn't let all hell break loose in terms of fan allegiances? What if everyone everywhere starts picking teams a la carte and they don't even care about season tickets? I don't know, I don't even remember what point I was initially making, I don't even want the Rays to move, lay off.

[IceCap]

27 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

Is it because it didn't/hasn't taken in Phoenix? Man, Phoenix. 

Well it was trotted out as an excuse for the Coyotes ten years back. Here we are, ten years later, and it's still a black hole of money and dreams. So obviously the "just wait until the kids grow up!" argument isn't universal. It worked in Columbus. It didn't work in Phoenix/Arizona. At the very least? The fact that it's not a universal constant means it has to be treated skeptically. We can't just go "oh that makes sense!" We need to understand it in the context of what market is being discussed. "Look at how many Twitter followers the Rays have!" isn't exactly a strong argument in that team's favour.

 

With Columbus? You have a city that's far enough outside of any one NHL market. So while you did have Blackhawks, Pens, and Red Wings fans there prior to the Blue Jackets' arrival? It's not like any team truly had a local connection. I suspect it's easier for a new team to come in and plant it's flag, because suddenly there is a local side to support.

With Sunbelt expansion/relocation like the Rays or Coyotes? You're not dealing with kids whose parents were from Columbus. You're dealing with kids with parents from Pittsburgh, Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Montreal, Boston, New York, etc...

In those cases? It would certainly be harder for new teams to break in. Kids will gravitate towards the teams their parents root for. And if their parents have a direct connection to the locales of other, more established, teams? Those connections will be harder to severe then the connections fans in Columbus had to teams that were never truly local.

 

It's never exact, because human behaviour isn't exact. Still? I think we need to take each "new" market (markets that received teams from the 1990s onward) on a case by case basis.

 

Tampa is interesting to me though. Why can the Lightning make a go of it when the Rays can't? Same market. Same uphill battle. One team made it, the other didn't. And yeah, the Rays are six years younger. So what? I wasn't in Tampa six years ago, but I suspect the Lightning weren't doing as poorly back then as the Rays are now. If they were? They would have come up in NHL relocation talk. And I can't remember a point where they were. Outside of a brief window where the Saw movie guys were running them into the ground. So it's not as if the Rays will suddenly be where the Lightning are now in six years. There's something wrong on the baseball side of things.

 

Maybe it's the Rays' stadium (it really is the worst in the big four) or the drive needed to get there. Maybe baseball loyalties just die harder than hockey ones? I have no idea, but it's worth considering. Or maybe it's just one of those "human behaviour isn't exact" sort of things. Where hockey took and baseball didn't for no other reason then the fact that hockey took and baseball didn't.

Regardless? Baseball's not in a good spot in the Tampa Bay area at the moment. I'll grant that a new stadium couldn't hurt the situation. I'm just not convinced it's the silver bullet many seem to think it is.

 

 

[DG_ThenNowForever]

No one has ever made an argument to expand to a new market by saying "it'll be great in 30 years." That's an after-the-fact justification for low attendance.

[leopard88]

19 hours ago, DG_Now said:

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

 

By showing clips of Roy Hobbs playing catch with his son in the middle of a wheat field.  I don't remember before that.

 

. . . or did you mean Field of Schemes?  

[Sport]

8 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

Well it was trotted out as an excuse for the Coyotes ten years back. Here we are, ten years later, and it's still a black hole of money and dreams. So obviously the "just wait until the kids grow up!" argument isn't universal. It worked in Columbus. It didn't work in Phoenix/Arizona. At the very least? The fact that it's not a universal constant means it has to be treated skeptically. We can't just go "oh that makes sense!" We need to understand it in the context of what market is being discussed. "Look at how many Twitter followers the Rays have!" isn't exactly a strong argument in that team's favour.

 

With Columbus? You have a city that's far enough outside of any one NHL market. So while you did have Blackhawks, Pens, and Red Wings fans there prior to the Blue Jackets' arrival? It's not like any team truly had a local connection. I suspect it's easier for a new team to come in and plant it's flag, because suddenly there is a local side to support.

With Sunbelt expansion/relocation like the Rays or Coyotes? You're not dealing with kids whose parents were from Columbus. You're dealing with kids with parents from Pittsburgh, Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Montreal, Boston, New York, etc...

In those cases? It would certainly be harder for new teams to break in. Kids will gravitate towards the teams their parents root for. And if their parents have a direct connection to the locales of other, more established, teams? Those connections will be harder to severe then the connections fans in Columbus had to teams that were never truly local.

 

It's never exact, because human behaviour isn't exact. Still? I think we need to take each "new" market (markets that received teams from the 1990s onward) on a case by case basis.

 

Tampa is interesting to me though. Why can the Lightning make a go of it when the Rays can't? Same market. Same uphill battle. One team made it, the other didn't. And yeah, the Rays are six years younger. So what? I wasn't in Tampa six years ago, but I suspect the Lightning weren't doing as poorly back then as the Rays are now. If they were? They would have come up in NHL relocation talk. And I can't remember a point where they were. Outside of a brief window where the Saw movie guys were running them into the ground. So it's not as if the Rays will suddenly be where the Lightning are now in six years. There's something wrong on the baseball side of things.

 

Maybe it's the Rays' stadium (it really is the worst in the big four) or the drive needed to get there. Maybe baseball loyalties just die harder than hockey ones? I have no idea, but it's worth considering. Or maybe it's just one of those "human behaviour isn't exact" sort of things. Where hockey took and baseball didn't for no other reason then the fact that hockey took and baseball didn't.

Regardless? Baseball's not in a good spot in the Tampa Bay area at the moment. I'll grant that a new stadium couldn't hurt the situation. I'm just not convinced it's the silver bullet many seem to think it is.

 

 

 

But you see my point? Kids do grow up to become adult ticket buyers. That's true for every professional sports franchise no matter the age, otherwise they all would've folded long ago. If a team's been in a market for a generation the next wave of young people joining the job force, at the very least, won't hurt the team's bottom line. I can see where people scoff at message board defenders fully depending on this coming wave of lifelong fans with new money that may or may not ever come, but I don't get the dismissal of the entire concept when all of pro sports is built upon it. Maybe we do need to be a little more patient too. Auston Matthews is still only 19. If he wasn't in the NHL he wouldn't be buying Coyotes tickets yet. 

 

And I really do think Tampa's baseball situation is as simple as stadium location. The Lightning have done well because of a centrally located facility. 

[SFGiants58]

10 hours ago, McCarthy said:

I just want to talk about why "when the kids grow up" is off the table here. 

 

That line of logic is only brought out when we talk about Mighty Ducks nostalgia, when it also applies to so many other facets of branding and marketing.

 

I'd also add that part of the Rays' problem is marketing. They totally bungled marketing themselves in 1998 and in the following years.

[DG_ThenNowForever]

17 minutes ago, SFGiants58 said:

 

That line of logic is only brought out when we talk about Mighty Ducks nostalgia, when it also applies to so many other facets of branding and marketing.

 

I'd also add that part of the Rays' problem is marketing. They totally bungled marketing themselves in 1998 and in the following years.

 

It wasn't too long after they started that they led with Boggs, McGriff, Canseco and some other 80s superhero. It made a lot of sense at the time, even if it didn't correlate to wins.

[Gothamite]

1 hour ago, McCarthy said:

And I really do think Tampa's baseball situation is as simple as stadium location. The Lightning have done well because of a centrally located facility. 

 

I dunno about that.   We'll see if the Tampa Bay Rowdies get into MLS, because they've been drawing pretty well by minor-league standards in a park every bit as "out of the way".  And their plan to expand the stadium in the same location means they're expecting to surpass the Rays' average attendance.

[DG_ThenNowForever]

44 minutes ago, DG_Now said:

 

It wasn't too long after they started that they led with Boggs, McGriff, Canseco and some other 80s superhero. It made a lot of sense at the time, even if it didn't correlate to wins.

 

I looked it up -- It wasn't an 80s superhero, but instead a Coors Field-goosed Vinny Castilla (who only hit for power at Coors), and Boggs was gone but replaced by another flash in the pan in Greg Vaughn. The 2000 Rays' big marketing push was to go in all-in on steroid sluggers because it was working for everyone else in the league. They instead finished second-last in attendance in the AL (and 21 games under .500).

[Sport]

22 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

 

I dunno about that.   We'll see if the Tampa Bay Rowdies get into MLS, because they've been drawing pretty well by minor-league standards in a park every bit as "out of the way".  And their plan to expand the stadium in the same location means they're expecting to surpass the Rays' average attendance.

 

Apples and oranges. The Rays have 81 home games on mostly weekdays and nights in a bad indoor stadium versus a nice outdoor facility for mostly weekend games that only happen 16 times a season. Soccer is like the NFL where the games are events. The charm of baseball and the long season is that it happens every day, but that also makes A fan attending every game much less necessary. 

 

Baseball's and hockey's schedules are more analogous in terms of volume that a market is asked to support and the reason the hockey team does just fine in Tampa is the location of the arena. 

[Gothamite]

Oh, yeah.  I know.  It's not the same situation.  But soccer also has weekday games, and that doesn't seem to deter the Rowdies' fans.   Just think it's interesting that Bill Edwards is staking the very future of his team on the same area that the apologists keep telling us is box-office poison.

 

This, however:

 

5 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

the reason the hockey team does just fine in Tampa is the location of the arena. 

 

is totally unproven. 

[chrysleraspen08]

22 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.  

 

The Argos are an interesting case to examine on their own. One way that I feel like they'd be different in this case is that their games are broadcasted nationwide on TSN, so for all we know 90% of those viewers could be Riders fans out in Saskatchewan who live and die by the CFL and wouldn't be able to go and see most Argos games in person.

 

As for the Rays, I feel like there is still a lot of potential there. I can't really state my reasons without saying what almost everybody else has said multiple times, however I feel like a good market to compare to Tampa with a lot of things is Atlanta. Sure, Atlanta's metro population is about twice the size as Tampa is, but they're both cities that have a ton of transplants and have both at one point had stadiums that are located away from the fanbase. The Braves are 30 years older than the Rays and have had lots of success over the years, but even that didn't do a whole lot for their attendance, even when they were good (but still slightly better than the Rays). But the main reason I compare them is to see how the Cobb County experiment goes for the Braves long term. From what I've seen so far, it is going very well for them. Their average attendance is higher now than it was in some of their more recently competitive years. I'm sure that may drop off a little bit if they still suck in 3 or 4 years, but only time will tell. I feel like if the Rays do something like that and bring the ballpark closer to Tampa (which might be a while since they're stuck in their agreement with St. Petes), the numbers will rise and they will become a viable market, or at least see some moderate success.

[Jer15]

2 hours ago, chrysleraspen08 said:

 

The Argos are an interesting case to examine on their own. One way that I feel like they'd be different in this case is that their games are broadcasted nationwide on TSN, so for all we know 90% of those viewers could be Riders fans out in Saskatchewan who live and die by the CFL and wouldn't be able to go and see most Argos games in person.

That is a major difference when trying to compare the TV numbers for sure, no question. I keep that in mind with comment I made and with the comments I make below.

 

To tie this back in to the Rays though, I moved to Hamilton this summer. I literally live within a 5 min walk to the stadium but I grew up (for 30+ years) in Brampton, just outside of Toronto. 

 

Toronto, during the summer, isn't even worth driving to when you live in Brampton/Mississauga/Oakville/Vaughan in my opinion due to the volume of traffic. I know a lot of other people who say the same. Taking the train into the city is an option, but there is 1 line that has all-day 2 way service which I would have to drive to first and then take the train.

So, people like me who are CFL fans and would consider going to an Argos game might say "forget it" due to traffic/the hassle of getting there and just watch it on TV.

I get the feeling that may be a similar thing going on with the Rays (obviously I don't know for sure, I have never been to Tampa Bay).

 

Now, in Hamilton on the other hand, even with the stadium in the middle of a residential area and almost no parking options (seriously, people ask to park on my front lawn on game day) besides for street parking and the local strip plazas, they still draw really well. Even with the cluster-you-know-what that it is around the stadium on game day I would say that an hour after the game is over, the streets are clear again. It's not a pain to get to and traffic flows well.

 

NOW; I realize there are other factors in play with the Rays, I'm only speaking to the what the TV numbers represent and my personal experience .

But, if the TV presentation will do the trick I might even say that TV numbers being good might reflect that "TV is good enough" and, potentially for many reasons like the traffic situation I use as an example, that is keeping people at home and away from the stadium. I know I've heard this argument about the NFL before as well....but again, this thread is about the Rays and I'm really not trying to make it a football thread. 

[IceCap]

8 hours ago, McCarthy said:

But you see my point?

Absolutely. It's worked in Columbus and Tampa as far as the NHL goes (there are other examples, but I feel like these two are the most notable). And I feel like it's worked for Arizona as far as MLB goes. 

 

My point is that it's not absolute. And we have cases where it's worked for one market in one sport but failed in the same market for another sport. Tampa Bay and Arizona are practically mirror images of each other. In Arizona? Baseball took. Hockey didn't. In the Tampa Bay area? Hockey took and baseball didn't. 

 

We can even cross-reference teams in the same sport across markets. The Lightning began play in 1992. The Jets arrived in Phoenix to begin play as the Coyotes in 1996.

If you want to use the Lightning as a success story of how to grow a fanbase over time? You have to concede that the same approach failed in Arizona. The Lightning were certainly not in the same piss-poor shape the Coyotes are in currently four years ago.

 

8 hours ago, McCarthy said:

Auston Matthews is still only 19. If he wasn't in the NHL he wouldn't be buying Coyotes tickets yet. 

Again though, Arizona is still a failed NHL market if you want to use Tampa as an example of the "wait until kids grow up" model.

 

Besides that? We need to factor both time and money into things. @DG_Now is right. No one ever proposes a new market and leads with "it'll be great in thirty years!" 

I'd like to expand on that though. There's a reason why no one leads with that. Time and money. And since time is money? Money and money. 

 

The Coyotes have been in Arizona for 21 years. They have never turned a profit in over two decades in the market. Hundreds of millions of dollars- many of it from the public coffers- have essentially been thrown away. 

Auston Matthews may only be 19. Kids who were ten when the Coyotes came to town though? They're thirty-one.

 

So my question is how much more money do you expect to waste when, after 21 years, every penny spent on this endeavour has been for naught?

Is it fair to the taxpayers of Arizona, or fans elsewhere in locales without teams, or the league's own financial well being, to keep the Coyotes alive and siphoning funds in the name of "patience"?

 

I don't think so. You're using Tampa and Columbus as your benchmarks for success. Ok, fair enough. The Coyotes are still a failure if judged against those standards.

[Sport]

1 hour ago, Ice_Cap said:

Absolutely. It's worked in Columbus and Tampa as far as the NHL goes (there are other examples, but I feel like these two are the most notable). And I feel like it's worked for Arizona as far as MLB goes. 

 

My point is that it's not absolute.

 

Right, it's not absolute, but it is does happen. What's irksome is every time it comes up in threads on this message board specifically the entire concept is laughed away as if it's a thoroughly debunked fallacy. It's not. There's dozens of examples dating back much farther and in more sports than just 1990's NHL expansion teams that prove my point. If I was wrong there would't be a pro sports franchise. 

 

1 hour ago, Ice_Cap said:

And we have cases where it's worked for one market in one sport but failed in the same market for another sport. Tampa Bay and Arizona are practically mirror images of each other. In Arizona? Baseball took. Hockey didn't. In the Tampa Bay area? Hockey took and baseball didn't. 

 

Funny that in Phoenix the baseball stadium is centrally located and the hockey arena isn't and it's the opposite for Tampa and the stronger support in both cases goes to the team that is easier to get to. To me the problem and solution in both cases is pretty obvious and simple.

 

1 hour ago, Ice_Cap said:

We can even cross-reference teams in the same sport across markets. The Lightning began play in 1992. The Jets arrived in Phoenix to begin play as the Coyotes in 1996.

If you want to use the Lightning as a success story of how to grow a fanbase over time? You have to concede that the same approach failed in Arizona. The Lightning were certainly not in the same piss-poor shape the Coyotes are in currently four years ago.

 

Again though, Arizona is still a failed NHL market if you want to use Tampa as an example of the "wait until kids grow up" model.

 

Besides that? We need to factor both time and money into things. @DG_Now is right. No one ever proposes a new market and leads with "it'll be great in thirty years!" 

I'd like to expand on that though. There's a reason why no one leads with that. Time and money. And since time is money? Money and money. 

 

The Coyotes have been in Arizona for 21 years. They have never turned a profit in over two decades in the market. Hundreds of millions of dollars- many of it from the public coffers- have essentially been thrown away. 

Auston Matthews may only be 19. Kids who were ten when the Coyotes came to town though? They're thirty-one.

 

So my question is how much more money do you expect to waste when, after 21 years, every penny spent on this endeavour has been for naught?

Is it fair to the taxpayers of Arizona, or fans elsewhere in locales without teams, or the league's own financial well being, to keep the Coyotes alive and siphoning funds in the name of "patience"?

 

I don't think so. You're using Tampa and Columbus as your benchmarks for success. Ok, fair enough. The Coyotes are still a failure if judged against those standards.

 

You're not saying anything here I disagree with. Admittedly Phoenix is a failed hockey market, I think the team needs to move on, and I don't mean to defend it. I just used Auston Matthews to put into perspective your timeline for how long it takes to age young fans into consumers and posit that it's still too quick. A Phoenix-raised kid his exact age is doing keg stands at Arizona State right now. He doesn't have disposable income yet and isn't buying hockey tickets. Now all of that would only matter for their market if they hadn't spent the last 15 years poisoning the well by being a stupidly managed non-factor in BFE Arizona. That's why I said ":censored: Phoenix" because they've burned a lot of goodwill for experimental sports markets just by being sh****.

 

 

[The_Admiral]

25 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

Funny that in Phoenix the baseball stadium is centrally located and the hockey arena isn't and it's the opposite for Tampa and the stronger support in both cases goes to the team that is easier to get to. To me the problem and solution in both cases is pretty obvious and simple.

 

But the Rays do get good TV ratings, while the Coyotes flirt with losing to infomercials.