3 Responses to “Change in Baseball Attendance 2008 to 2009”

1. Andy Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 4:18 am

   That's amazing. The Mets and Yankees are down 17,000 fans per game total, while the result of baseball is up 16,000 fans per game total.

2. tomepp Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 3:24 pm

   Sean - I took your data and included win-loss record, divisional rank, and games back/ahead data for those dates to see any correlation between how the team is faring and attendance. Of course, early season ticket sales probably have more to with how the team fared last season than this season, but including that would get too complicated.

   I don't know if there's a way to include the results from my spreadsheet other than manually typing it in (way too much effort), but if one of the blog "experts" clues me in or is willing to convert it somehow, I'm more than happy to share the data.

   Anyway, here are some interesting points I found in those results.

   Some teams doing better this year aren't seeing it in the box-office receipts:

   - Detroit is down 9795/G despite being up 4 positions in the standings (1st in div. instead of 5th) and +4.5 GB (up 1 game instead of 3.5 games back).

   - Similarly, Toronto is down 3473/G despite being up 3 positions (1st instead of 4th) and +9.5 GB (up 3 games instead of 6.5 games back).

   - The Dodgers are also down 4044/G despite a +9 GB improvement (up 6 games vs 3 GB; 1st in div. instead of 2nd)

   - The Mets attendance is down the most of any team (-10924/G) despite the fact that they are 2 positions ahead in the standings (1st in div. vs 3rd) and +2.5 GB (up 0.5 games vs 2 GB).

   - The Yankees are the only other team whose attendance is down (-6319/G) despite a better on-field performance so far (up 2 positions - they were in 5th last year, and +1.5 GB).

   Conversely, some teams struggling on the field are putting more seats in the stands:

   - Tampa Bay's attendance is up 7570/G despite the fact that they are down 3 positions (4th instead of tied for 1st) and -6.5 GB.

   - The Marlins are up 5889/G despite the fact that they are 2 positions lower in the standings (4th instead of 2nd) and 3 more GB (3.5 GB instead of 0.5 GB). This could be accounted for by their extremely hot start (11-1) before their more recent slide into mediocrity.

   - The Angels are also up 1433/G in attendance despite the fact that they were leading the division by 0.5 games last year and are in 2nd place, 3.5 games back this year.

   And now for some consistency:

   - The biggest gainers in attendance (other than the Rays and Marlins) are Kansas City (+4605/G), Philadelphia (+3893/G), and the Rangers (+3019/G). All of these teams have also improved in the standings vs last year.

   - The Royals are in 2nd instead of 4th place, and 1.5 games closer (1 GB vs 2.5 GB).

   - The Phillies are in the same position - 2nd in the division - that they were in last year, but 1 game closer (0.5 GB vs 1.5 GB). Winning last year's World Series probably also helped move April ticket sales.

   - The Rangers lead their division by 4.5 games instead of being in 3rd place, trailing by 4 GB.

   - Other than the Tigers and Mets, Washington has taken the hardest attendance hit (-9097/G), but they are 5.5 games further back than they were last year (they were last in the division both years).

   - The team with the biggest drop in standings relative to last year was Arizona - they went from first in the division last year to last in the division this year, and from up 4.5 games to 11 GB (a -15.5 GB swing), but they’ve only taken a fairly small hit in attendance (-518/G). In fact, they’re almost exactly at the median attendance change of -510/G.

   Anyway, if anyone knows how to post the spreadsheet (or how to convert it for posting), let me know!

3. phattyjrb Says:
   May 21st, 2009 at 8:14 am

   Mets total attendance may be down but % capacity is up. Moving to CitiField cost the Mets over 15,000 seats...