Rangers, Twins, D-Backs, and Phillies all advance with sweeps, Preller and Melvin stay with the Padres, plus discussion about the Rays' attendance, the FEMA alert, and more.
The Mets win!!!!! Funny thing. The season was over long ago, but I followed every game every day. I celebrate every win, moan over every loss While I find myself actually relieved I can ignore the Giants the rest of the way. It's clear I love baseball. It's clear I am not so in love with football. This is how it should be. (I land in the middle about the Knicks.)
I was at a graveside funeral when the FEMAlert came through. It rolls through the attendees five or six at a time. And silencing your phone didn't do any good. Fortunately, it came while the actual burial was going on - in Jewish tradition, the attendees literally bury the body instead of the cemetery staff, as this is considered the ultimate kindness since the deceased cannot return the kindness - so no speeches were interrupted. But it was sort of surreal. Also, the text message that came with the alert collapsed into gibberish on my phone, ending in symbols instead of letters. Weird.
Kind of a bland first round, wasn't it? Eight wild card series so far, and seven sweeps. And I doubt that will change. But at least last year there were some exciting games.
My phone only vibrated. It didn't make any actual noise. I don't know why that was, but I'm not going to complain.
I haven't played fantasy baseball in years, but my first thought upon reading about the Mets/Marlins game and the 9th inning stats not counting was "I wonder if that affected any fantasy outcomes."
In my fantasy league, the only Mets/Marlins in the championship were Starling Marte (on the IL) and the losing team had Braxton Garrett. The champ remained the champ, but I have to imagine there are leagues out there with quite the story this morning!
I can’t recall details but a few years back something weird happened in a NFL game -- maybe a yardage change, maybe a garbage TD by a team trailing by 20, maybe a game went to OT -- that led to a number of stories how that changed the outcome of a fantasy championship.
I love the Knicks but not in the same way. I think it's a combination of loving the Mets and baseball a lot longer, and having more to like about the Mets over the years. I am later in coming to love the NBA (and with some reservations since the overall sport goes through stretches when it's less interesting). And the Knicks have been putrid in basketball ways. When you have just one great player - Carmelo - and he does just one thing every night, it gets less exciting that a great pitcher every five days.
I dealt with the emergency broadcast test during a video hearing. Not great. And just now as I’m sitting in a hospital waiting area (routine follow up only!) I got an even louder test of its emergency intercom system.
My Bill Gates / George Soros 5G chip has told me to start the revolution, comrades!
“Also, the text message that came with the alert collapsed into gibberish on my phone, ending in symbols instead of letters. Weird.”
Sounds like you got the zombie signal. The Deep State only sent it to some, while everyone else got a normal alert - otherwise it would have been too obvious. I would advise those around you to stay away before you fully turn.
Wow - haven't thought about Dolllhouse in years. That show had so much potential. Most of it wasted, IMO. Cell was a Stephen King novel, right? I read that too.
I was 40 minutes into a theatre show (The Brothers Paranormal, which is very much worth seeing) when several phones throughout the audience started screeching. There had been several announcements prior to the beginning of Act 1 about the upcoming test and would everyone *please* make sure their phones were turned off. The actors on stage paused for a few seconds and then carried on.
Thanks to you and anyone else who offered condolences. My brother's mother in law passed away, and while I can't speak for others about such a relationship, she was as much part of my family as my mom or my wife's parents. We spent many Thanksgivings and Hanukkahs at her home, and she was always welcoming and gracious.
I would go on a snarky rant about the Rays’ attendance or the Blue Jays’ heinous game management but honestly I just woke up and am so tired that I’ll let someone else do it. I had the test dream. *shudders*
BTW if anyone wants a good read later today, WaPo did a fantastic story about Woj and Shams, the two NBA insiders. And by fantastic I mean I’m thoroughly disgusted at the conduct described by both reporters and people in the NBA. If I was an NBA beat reporter, I would tell my editors, “Let me go write or chase actual human interest stories, let those two chase who is getting a 10-day contract in the G League.”
Keep up the good work Bill. I can’t wait to see what you have planned for keeping us entertained on Friday. Hopefully there’s non-chain pizza involved.
No luck reading that, but I have seen others talk about that before. There was a scathing retort by former ESPN blogger Henry Abbott decrying them earlier in the week.
That’s where I found the story too, the Abbott quote going viral on Twix.
Also totally random thing. Yesterday I did a Publix run and got sliced pineapples. I accidently froze them. I had one last night and honestly I think that’s how I’m keeping my sliced pineapples now. It was incredible! All hail the mundane things in life 🙇🏻♂️🙇🏻♂️
Abbott's quote was weird, though. I read pieces where he claimed there was mone laundering but has never once proven it. And his accusations about doping are even more empty. Not saying he's wrong, but he never backs up his claims. (He's also a PED scold.)
Years ago when the Expos were playing some home games in (on?) Puerto Rico, I went to a game. I didn’t find any beer vendors roaming the aisles but they did have frozen pina coladas.
"But McDonough left out some very important context: their games were scheduled for 3 PM ET on weekdays. The game times were announced with very little prep time, meaning time to allow fans to request time off work, to rearrange preexisting plans, etc."
So explain Minnesota having a few hundred shy of TWICE as many fans as the Rays on the same day with a similar start time for their time zone. Both teams have known (realistically) for a while they would host these games. Both teams faced a 3pm-ish local time start. Both teams didn't have that start time announced until 2 days before, but it wasn't hard to guess which slots they were going to get.
10/3 Game 1 ALDS attendance
Tampa Bay: 19,704 (First pitch: 3:07 PM Eastern)
Minnesota: 38,450 (First pitch: 3:40 PM Central)
Had the Twins had a paltry crowd, I'd listen to this argument. But the Twins drew TWICE as many people at relatively the same time with the same amount of notice of game time and location.
Also consider ease of getting to the ballpark in each city. I can hop on light rail and be dropped off in front of Target Field in downtown Minneapolis, which is my usual way of going to games. I've never been to a Rays game in St. Pete, but I understand it is not an easy trip from Tampa. Still, if you really care, you'll get there.
I went to Tuesday's game. Yeah, lots more attendance than Tampa but as Kathy notes, it's an easy commute and lots of parking if you do any research at all. What I was struck with was how many Canadians made it -- they had the same issue with advance notice but had to find a hotel and then make the 12 hour drive from Moose Jaw or wherever. I suppose Twins or Mariners games are the closest for all of the prairie and western provinces.
There is a reason to point out the attendance numbers, and it's not being a fan-scold. It's because the Rays are on the verge of repeating the same mistake that happened 35 years ago, and building a ballpark where nobody wants to go.
There are several issues for the Rays playoff attendance. The Rays make you by playoff tickets for the first two rounds. Last year they sat on the second round money for 3 months beforw refunding, I was not going to do that again. They didn't start selling single game tix until afternoon on Monday. I would have picked up the $25 tickets but the Rays are only on TV in lass than half our market due to battles with the cable cos. I was excited to see them on TV finally. Then I wasn't.
No matter how much I liked a team that would be a big nope from me. I'm not giving anyone a big chunk of money for three months until they finally got around to refunding it. Especially if they have a habit of losing early so I most likely wouldn't see the games I paid for anyway.
Teams do some really crappy stuff with playoff money. The Cubs are forcing me to use it toward 2024 season tickets -- I knew this going on -- so not even making a refund an option.
What’s amazing about the Rays is teams usually sell out by selling season ticket holders their playoff tickets AND offering extra strips if season ticket count is low enough.
I wonder how much is general workplace culture? Maybe Minnesota has more jobs that offer time off in the first place, and since the Twins are a bigger deal there than the Rays if someone asks for the afternoon off to go to a baseball game, their boss or supervisor knows what they are talking about and is more likely to okay it. While in Tampa a boss or supervisor may not have even heard they are playing, and definitely isn't going to give the drudge the afternoon off for some stupid game that can't be important if no one else cares about it, either.
No way would the attendance be stellar, even with a night game, but it might be just low instead of pathetically low.
Another thought (because I've done just this) is if fans want to go to a couple playoff games, they don't have the budget for more, so they are skipping the first series to see if the Rays advance and spend their limited playoff dollars on a team that didn't flame out early. I've sometimes skipped the first series because I didn't want to waste my ticket on an early losing series, I wanted to see if the team could advance and then I'd get a ticket for a later round series if they showed a little staying power.
So the Rays ownership wants to change from playing in a half empty crummy ballpark to a half empty luxury stadium. Have to wonder if someone there is reconsidering if St.Pete is really the right place.
The twin cities have very different demographics than Tampa, so you're not really comparing apples to oranges. Many of the retirees hereabouts with the money and flexible schedules to attend a 3PM game with little notice are transplants, and likely have allegiance to their hometown teams. For the local Rays fans who are regular folks with jobs and/or kids the median income is considerably less here than in the twin cities so it isn't necessarily as easy to take time off without advanced notice. The road/bridge layouts are not optimal and get very crowded in the afternoons; it's the worst possible time to try to get anywhere. I am a Rays fan from Sarasota, which is about a 40 minute drive in the evenings or weekends, but could easily be two to three times that in the middle of the afternoon. And if there is an accident on one of the major roads and you are stuck on a bridge with no way to bail out and take another route...fuggetaboutit.
That time isn’t just inconvenient it is impossible for most working folks and especially those with children to attend a midweek game at 3PM most especially WITH NO ADVANCED NOTICE. This is 100% on MLB for scheduling that awful time. I’m mad as hell because I would definitely would have gone. Hell, I couldn’t even watch or listen to the game much less attend because I was working. I know many people who would’ve attended if the games were in the evening. I have friends who bought tickets last week as soon as they clinched the spot, and they could not go. The tickets were wasted. I hope (but highly doubt) they can get refunds. There are many Rays fans in my circle, and the few that were able to go at those times couldn't find anyone to go with them because they had to work or their kids were in school.
This is why I take the "if you really loved them you'd be there" with a grain of salt. Sure, but in reality life is complex and things suck and you have to miss stuff!
Basically life happens. If my team was in the playoffs this year, and I had no problem getting time off from work, I wouldn't be able to go because I went to 2 weddings this summer, I redecorated my bedroom and replaced my bed, and my car insurance is due this month, so I don't have an extra cash that I could justify for playoff games and the parking and associated other expenses.
I only have so much I can allocate to "really infrequent expenses" and no matter how much fun a playoff baseball game might be, those dollars have already been used for other things. I think there is not just so much more demand on people's time but also on their budget and it's hard to fit in an extra thing. Which makes me even more sorry for fans who got tickets and WANTED to go but life got in the way and they couldn't make it.
Having playoff games in the afternoon midweek isn't a surprise. Heck, with a 3 PM start you can work half a day and still make it to the stadium for the game.
While I'm not a Florida resident, I've seen 15-20 games at the Trop over the years so I know what the drive from Tampa is like.
Well, 47K people showed up in Minnesota on the same workday at basically the same time WITH NO ADVANCED NOTICE as well.
This isn't the A's whining about low attendance while they're gutting the team and booking moving trucks. Y'all have been in the playoffs for a half decade straight. If Twins fans can fill their park in the exact same situation, the excuses of Rays fans come off as just that - excuses.
I'm not surprised at the low attendance (in general) as the year-to-year attendance is typically low. But for the postseason, I find it very surprising. Otherwise, I know many Cardinals fans (me included) who have (or would have) taken their kids out of school to go to a playoff game in a hot minute. Same for Redlegs fans, Cubs fans, etc... The lack of advanced notice wasn't a huge issue for the other teams with similar notices (or lack thereof). Here's to hoping the trend doesn't continue Dan. Baseball is better when every team has solid backing.
Having read your comment again...I completely forgot about the number of transplants in the Tampa area. That certainly doesn't help matters. Solid point. Thank you for reminding me.
I’m going to have to disagree with the start time excuse. If the Mets or the Yankees made the playoffs and the game started at 1/2/3/4/5 PM or any time for that matter, it would be sold out, whether there was a day or a weeks notice of the time.
The Tampa problem may be better related to the amount of transplants, not just in Florida as a whole, but the Tampa/St. Pete area specifically. There are lots of them and unless you are a diehard baseball fan, you’re probably not going to watch the Rays playoff game if you’re from another area and root for your hometown team.
A ten year old kid going to games the first Rays season is now old enough to have her own ten year old to take now. 25 years is a long time to build home town fans.
That seems rather speculative. My guess is that most kids in Florida don’t become Boston or Cleveland or St Louis fans simply because their parents moved from there 30 years ago.
And it doesn’t fit cities like Phoenix or Atlanta that also have massive influx of population.
This is all speculative - my kids are Mets/Knicks fans no matter how many times I try to steer them away from the misery, who knows for sure, maybe the Shadow ?
Speculative but I'd bet on it, if I were a better. My theory is that there's a continual churn of retirees moving to Florida, enjoying the sun, deceasing, rinse, repeat; hence to built-up loyalties. And these olds don't have 10-year olds.
FWIW, I'm a Yankee fan due to having grown up near NYC in the 80s and 90s, and because my mom was a Yankee fan, though I have lived in PA since 1997.
My 15-year old son is a huge Yankee fan himself - because of me - even though he has only ever lived in Pennsylvania.
As a rule, kids become fans of either
1. the local team
2. a team that's really good when they start following the game, or
3. the team that their parent(s) follow.
So it's entirely possible that young kids in the Tampa area are eschewing the first two of those because they're going with the third, though I imagine that most of the children of transplants to Florida are themselves adults who did not transplant with their retired parents, so I'm not sure how much this would apply.
It does seem like the 3-month escrow factor probably looms large here. As usual, it makes more sense to blame the team than the fans.
I guess the argument can now be made you should only have a team in highly populated areas ? Or is it that Tampa fans aren’t really that loyal ? Maybe the weather is to blame ? It’s too nice to go to a game, let’s hit the beach !
Not at all. Just saying it’s silly to compare attendance in Tampa to attendance in NYC.
That said, the Yankees had trouble selling out playoff games last year, and them only getting 47k on a Sunday is WAY more embarrassing than Tampa pulling 20k on a mid-week afternoon
That’s odd, unless what I saw on the internet was wrong, new Yankee stadium has a capacity of 46k and change and it opened in 2009 ? I’m not sure how the math works here, has the seating been reduced since ? Not a yankee fan, so I have no idea.
It’s the game time. No wait. It’s the stadium. No wait. It’s the location. No wait it’s the owners. No wait.
The Rays have had terrible attendance since their first season, and the only thing we can apparently be sure of is that it’s never because of the fans themselves. There’s always another reason.
Actually, by definition it can’t be the fans’ fault, because they are the fanatics in the ball park. It thus must be a non- fans’ issue, which makes it a marketing problem.
As a fan of the long season, having the NL East and West champions play teams they led by 14 and 16 game’s respectively is surreal. And with the nature of the playoffs, either LAD and/or ATL could easily lose. Oh well. My aesthetic choices don’t control.
...
I don’t follow the Padres closely enough to *really* have an opinion but from my distance, it seems that they would be right to not overreact to a season with such a wild difference between pythag and real wins. Sometimes things break wrong without identifiable cause. Forcing causation can be counterproductive.
Like the discussion on the Rays attendance the Padres being much worse than their run differential comes down to a lot of things and Melvin is part of it. At the same time I don’t get firing someone long perceived as a good manager because the “team” had a weird year.
And I don't think a manager is binary good vs. bad or even fits along a two-dimensional line between good and bad. I think that every manager has a different skill set that can mesh better or worse with certain types of teams.
I think, for example, Dusty Baker is a great manager, but I don't think he is high on my list to run a very young club of prospects looking to break in.
It could well be that Melvin is a poor fit for this club, but the record - particularly the record in 1 run and extra inning games - would play a very small role in that conclusion.
THANK YOU for mentioning fit. I've been thinking a lot about that. I like Bob Melvin a lot, but just wonder if this isn't the right slot for him. Lots of us in our lives have gotten jobs we are quite capable of, and it's just not with the right organization for whatever reason.
For sure there are bad managers. Lots of guys who managed <2 seasons and never got another chance, though some are circumstances.
But agree on fit. I thought Melvin was awful when he managed the Mariners, but he’s gotten better and been in different situations. Joe Maddon was good for the Cubs for a while, then his stuff didn’t work and totally failed with the Angels. Especially in basketball and football there are a ton of coaches who are good at inspiring underdogs or coming up with creative strategies who don’t work with a highly talented teams. For all the amazing work John Thompson did at Georgetown he was the reason the US lost in the Olympics that one time.
Because of this emergency alert, and the discussion that surrounded it, I took a look at my phone's settings. It's an android that's only a few months old, and it has quite a few options in the emergency alert section, and when I was setting my phone up recently I'd opted to not have sound on these alerts. So I received a pop-up only. There is also a toggle to allow Spanish alerts when available. I have that turned off, but I mention it because some people got the notice in English and Spanish and speculated as to why that was. Anyway, these seem like a lot more options than one used to have, so if you didn't like the outcome of the alert, go in and see what you can control. Things have changed!
I turned all of my alerts off ages ago, but if you are with other people, those alerts are going to come to you anyway. Everyone else tends to leave them alone, and they will all check their phones and tell you that a flood is coming or there was an Amber Alert or, one time, a terrorist is on the loose. That last one is the exact reason I don't like alerts because they can be used for good reasons like warning people about floods or they can cause panic.
I turned off Amber Alerts because I can't envision a scenario where I could ever help. Telling me to look for a Nissan Sentra with a certain license plate isn't going to happen if I'm sitting at home or out to dinner. I don't ever read texts while I'm driving so even in the one case where I might be able to help, I won't be reading it until I'm parked.
I took a look at Tropicana field on a map, and I've seen people talk about this before, but man, that place seems like a pain in the ass to get to. I'm trying to imagine a big venue placed here on Coronado, where you can take the bridge or drive all the way south to IB and it's already bad enough with the military base traffic. This seems like it could be worse. (I'm not making arguments for anything here, just noticing.)
There are a million people in Pinellas County where St. Pete is located and includes Clearwater, Dunedin and many other towns going north. I have been to several games coming from Dunedin where my mother lives and it’s no different from other stadiums I have been been to and is easier than Atlanta, for example. Coming from Tampa there are three different bridges to St. Pete or you can come in on land from the north. It’s not an ideal location but it’s not that bad.
Edit: and Tampa Bay (Hillsborough and Pinellas counties) is not the same thing as Tampa (one city in Tampa Bay)
Is there any mass transit of note? (Atlanta traffic is a wild thing! The one time I went wasn't bad, but I was starting from Dunwoody, not the city center!)
The NYC baseball teams would be nowhere without the subways. OK, plenty of people drive. But I think the majority take the train. Triply so for the teams at MSG.
I only go to one game a year, since I live just north of Albany. But coming from there driving is by far the most practical way to do it. But they certainly try to incentivize mass transit by charging $40 to park. You'd need to be pretty wealthy to shrug off paying that every time if you were someone who goes all the time.
If you have amazing luck, you can find street parking in the Bronx. (And even though I think the fear of crime in NYC is exaggerated, you still run a risk of your car making its way elsewhere without you.) And you could in theory park at a lot in Flushing and walk from there to Citi Field, but it's not a pleasant walk. (I have done it a few times in broad daylight, and no one else seems to.)
But for me, if I drove, I would just want to avoid the traffic, But traffic is the main reason I quit driving.
Even traveling to the game from a lot of places in Pinellas like Clearwater, Dunedin etc is over a 30 minute drive. And everyone is on the same stretch of I-275 (including Tampa folks) to get to the park. I've seen multiple reports where the Rays have a significantly lower population density within a 30 minute drive from their stadium compared to other similar markets.
Seriously, am I supposed to interpret that as some remarkable hardship? I know I'm an outlier, living 2.5 hours from my favorite team (and concert venues), but I'd be a full-season season ticket holder for the O's if it only took me 30 minutes each way to get to Camden Yards.
Also, my alert went off at 118pm Central. Hopefully all those domestic violence victims who have a hidden second phone didn’t wait until the advertised time of 120pm to turn it off.
I'm laughing because when I got the notification for this, I couldn't see what it was in reference to, and so I interpreted PE as pulmonary embolism and I couldn't quite make sense of what you were joking about.
I will just point out that multiple outlets attempted to reach Melvin yesterday, but he was unavailable to confirm Preller’s comments. He was also given permission to speak to the Giants.
Twins radio reported that Yusei Kikuchi had PitchCom installed in his ear before Barrios threw a pitch in the 5th inning. So Bill is right - Barrios wasn't yanked because he walked Royce Lewis to lead things off. He was yanked because the plan all along was to bring in Kikuchi to pitch to two lefties the second time through the lineup. And John Schneider didn't have the whatever to say, "dude has never had better stuff. I'm sticking with him. Let Mark Shapiro yell at me if he wants."
I consider it a very minor victory that none of the playoff rounds are sponsored by gambling companies. Not that the playoffs should be sponsored, but I choose to see the positive. I doubt it will last
Question re. Attendance: Why do the Marlins still draw so few fans. I get the Royals and A's as mentioned above but I don't why the Marlins still have so few funs. Genuinely curious.
I think a lot of people in that area are still pissed about the way the stadium was financed, and vowed never to attend games there. Gator, what say you?
This is a valid question and there are lots of factors obviously (ownership, stadium location, etc.) but after 30 years I think it's also fair to say that Florida man (and woman) just doesn't care all that much about Rays or Marlins baseball. You'd still hate to see the fans that -are- there lose their team, which is why it's time to bring my idea into play:
Move one of the Florida teams to Nashville. Have the remaining team split their home games between Tampa and Miami. Financial impossibilities aside, this is the best idea.
The Marlins have finished last or next to last half of their seasons. They’ve never won the division. They have 8 winning years out of 31 (and 5 more where they won 79 or 80). They also have done a number of things to generate bad will -- tearing down the team after winning the World Series. I bet if you moved the Yankees to Miami, they’d draw 3 million. It’s the franchise not the city.
The idea that you can drop a BAD MLB team in a city and fans will just show up just doesn’t hold up. I see the same problem in Las Vegas and Nashville, which have other problems as well.
The Marlins made the playoffs (so, ostensibly a good team) this year and also finished 29th in attendance.
They won the world series in 2003. They finished 28th in attendance. In 2004, riding momentum from a title, they finished 26th. Even when the Marlins have been good (which, as you pointed out, is not often!) there just aren't folks coming to the games.
If you moved the Yankees to Miami, they might draw 3 million because they're a brand, but if you moved say the Brewers (a team with largely better on-field results than the Marlins) I think the Miami Brewers would still be bottom 5 in attendance just like the Marlins.
Attendance is a lagging indicator. Setting aside whether the Marlins were actually good this year, fans certainly wouldn't have bought season tickets anticipating the team being good or caught on to the team being in the wild card race until late in the season. Will be interesting to see if a playoff appearance boosts 2024 attendance.
I forget which year the Marlins won the World Series and then traded (what seemed like) all their good players in the off season. That would certainly kill the interest in even a championship team.
We'll agree to disagree, and likely never know, on the Miami Brewers. I think they'd see a significant attendance boost with a team that competes year in and year out. Admittedly the Yankees were a bad example.
1997 - Marlins win World Series, 11th in attendance.
1998 - Marlins tear down and lose 100+ games, 22nd in attendance.
Didn't include these in the original post though because the 1998 tear down was so f-ing ridiculous that I'm not going to ding the market for that. They should have burned down the stadium instead of going to games.
I never got the alert, and I got all three vaccines yesterday as well. Given that I woke up this morning, and looked as scruffy as usual in the mirror, I’m assuming I’m not a zombie.
If you don't feel like a zombie today, you are lucky. The COVID shot usually leaves me feeling meh. Can't speak for RSV yet since I am under 60, but shingles knocked me out completely.
First Covid shot made me angry. I mean, it knocked me out and I had some of the best sleep in my life, but I'm angry that I know that I'm capable of that kind of sleep but have never experienced it again.
On behalf of Ferg, I am deeply offended. As a Nats fan, yup. [I'm still rooting for them because of all my O's fan friends, though.]
This fan won’t stop you from beating on O’s ownership.
The team on the field is so likeable though that it’s hard to put his sins on them. You have to walk a fine line as an O’s fan these days.
No, it was a pandemic postseason game, since the flu was still affecting things.
The Mets win!!!!! Funny thing. The season was over long ago, but I followed every game every day. I celebrate every win, moan over every loss While I find myself actually relieved I can ignore the Giants the rest of the way. It's clear I love baseball. It's clear I am not so in love with football. This is how it should be. (I land in the middle about the Knicks.)
I was at a graveside funeral when the FEMAlert came through. It rolls through the attendees five or six at a time. And silencing your phone didn't do any good. Fortunately, it came while the actual burial was going on - in Jewish tradition, the attendees literally bury the body instead of the cemetery staff, as this is considered the ultimate kindness since the deceased cannot return the kindness - so no speeches were interrupted. But it was sort of surreal. Also, the text message that came with the alert collapsed into gibberish on my phone, ending in symbols instead of letters. Weird.
Kind of a bland first round, wasn't it? Eight wild card series so far, and seven sweeps. And I doubt that will change. But at least last year there were some exciting games.
First off, my condolences.
My phone only vibrated. It didn't make any actual noise. I don't know why that was, but I'm not going to complain.
I haven't played fantasy baseball in years, but my first thought upon reading about the Mets/Marlins game and the 9th inning stats not counting was "I wonder if that affected any fantasy outcomes."
In my fantasy league, the only Mets/Marlins in the championship were Starling Marte (on the IL) and the losing team had Braxton Garrett. The champ remained the champ, but I have to imagine there are leagues out there with quite the story this morning!
I can’t recall details but a few years back something weird happened in a NFL game -- maybe a yardage change, maybe a garbage TD by a team trailing by 20, maybe a game went to OT -- that led to a number of stories how that changed the outcome of a fantasy championship.
Yes, I vaguely remember that too. Can't recall the exact details either.
Google turned up https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/12/fantasy-football-ravens-stat-correction-championships-bad-beat, but that wasn't really it. There was also a lot of talk about the Damar Hamlin suspended game.
I read that it depends on your phone whether silencing worked for the test. It did work on mine.
I had the impression that you really loved the Knicks/basketball, as well as the Mets/baseball.
I love the Knicks but not in the same way. I think it's a combination of loving the Mets and baseball a lot longer, and having more to like about the Mets over the years. I am later in coming to love the NBA (and with some reservations since the overall sport goes through stretches when it's less interesting). And the Knicks have been putrid in basketball ways. When you have just one great player - Carmelo - and he does just one thing every night, it gets less exciting that a great pitcher every five days.
I dealt with the emergency broadcast test during a video hearing. Not great. And just now as I’m sitting in a hospital waiting area (routine follow up only!) I got an even louder test of its emergency intercom system.
My Bill Gates / George Soros 5G chip has told me to start the revolution, comrades!
“Also, the text message that came with the alert collapsed into gibberish on my phone, ending in symbols instead of letters. Weird.”
Sounds like you got the zombie signal. The Deep State only sent it to some, while everyone else got a normal alert - otherwise it would have been too obvious. I would advise those around you to stay away before you fully turn.
Fortunately, having watched Dollhouse and read about Cell, my brain is immune to the zombie signal.
Wow - haven't thought about Dolllhouse in years. That show had so much potential. Most of it wasted, IMO. Cell was a Stephen King novel, right? I read that too.
Try being a high school class when the FEMA alert went off...funny stuff.
I was 40 minutes into a theatre show (The Brothers Paranormal, which is very much worth seeing) when several phones throughout the audience started screeching. There had been several announcements prior to the beginning of Act 1 about the upcoming test and would everyone *please* make sure their phones were turned off. The actors on stage paused for a few seconds and then carried on.
I'm sorry Simon.
Thanks to you and anyone else who offered condolences. My brother's mother in law passed away, and while I can't speak for others about such a relationship, she was as much part of my family as my mom or my wife's parents. We spent many Thanksgivings and Hanukkahs at her home, and she was always welcoming and gracious.
I have a deep and abiding craving for more brains...in SO many politicians.
Zombies hate politicians. Too many empty calories.
I would go on a snarky rant about the Rays’ attendance or the Blue Jays’ heinous game management but honestly I just woke up and am so tired that I’ll let someone else do it. I had the test dream. *shudders*
BTW if anyone wants a good read later today, WaPo did a fantastic story about Woj and Shams, the two NBA insiders. And by fantastic I mean I’m thoroughly disgusted at the conduct described by both reporters and people in the NBA. If I was an NBA beat reporter, I would tell my editors, “Let me go write or chase actual human interest stories, let those two chase who is getting a 10-day contract in the G League.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/10/02/woj-shams-rivalry/ (tested and it works with paywall remover for those who don’t have WaPo subscription)
Keep up the good work Bill. I can’t wait to see what you have planned for keeping us entertained on Friday. Hopefully there’s non-chain pizza involved.
No luck reading that, but I have seen others talk about that before. There was a scathing retort by former ESPN blogger Henry Abbott decrying them earlier in the week.
That’s where I found the story too, the Abbott quote going viral on Twix.
Also totally random thing. Yesterday I did a Publix run and got sliced pineapples. I accidently froze them. I had one last night and honestly I think that’s how I’m keeping my sliced pineapples now. It was incredible! All hail the mundane things in life 🙇🏻♂️🙇🏻♂️
Abbott's quote was weird, though. I read pieces where he claimed there was mone laundering but has never once proven it. And his accusations about doping are even more empty. Not saying he's wrong, but he never backs up his claims. (He's also a PED scold.)
Frozen pineapple, frozen bananas and a little coconut milk. Toss it in a blender. With or without rum. Mmmmmm.
I now want a Pina Colada and it’s 8 a.m. Thanks buddy
Years ago when the Expos were playing some home games in (on?) Puerto Rico, I went to a game. I didn’t find any beer vendors roaming the aisles but they did have frozen pina coladas.
5 o'clock somewhere...
Ditto!
(adds items to grocery list)
So I guess what used to be strictly Heyman and baseball now applies to most, if not all, "insiders," regardless of sport: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMnMyPkXEAYbDAM?format=jpg&name=small
The best stuff in the WaPo this week is their series on Life Expectancy in America - and how it's worse under Republican-governed states.....
Expect plenty of "POBO" references until Craig returns.
"But McDonough left out some very important context: their games were scheduled for 3 PM ET on weekdays. The game times were announced with very little prep time, meaning time to allow fans to request time off work, to rearrange preexisting plans, etc."
So explain Minnesota having a few hundred shy of TWICE as many fans as the Rays on the same day with a similar start time for their time zone. Both teams have known (realistically) for a while they would host these games. Both teams faced a 3pm-ish local time start. Both teams didn't have that start time announced until 2 days before, but it wasn't hard to guess which slots they were going to get.
10/3 Game 1 ALDS attendance
Tampa Bay: 19,704 (First pitch: 3:07 PM Eastern)
Minnesota: 38,450 (First pitch: 3:40 PM Central)
Had the Twins had a paltry crowd, I'd listen to this argument. But the Twins drew TWICE as many people at relatively the same time with the same amount of notice of game time and location.
Also consider ease of getting to the ballpark in each city. I can hop on light rail and be dropped off in front of Target Field in downtown Minneapolis, which is my usual way of going to games. I've never been to a Rays game in St. Pete, but I understand it is not an easy trip from Tampa. Still, if you really care, you'll get there.
I went to Tuesday's game. Yeah, lots more attendance than Tampa but as Kathy notes, it's an easy commute and lots of parking if you do any research at all. What I was struck with was how many Canadians made it -- they had the same issue with advance notice but had to find a hotel and then make the 12 hour drive from Moose Jaw or wherever. I suppose Twins or Mariners games are the closest for all of the prairie and western provinces.
This is a great comparison.
There is a reason to point out the attendance numbers, and it's not being a fan-scold. It's because the Rays are on the verge of repeating the same mistake that happened 35 years ago, and building a ballpark where nobody wants to go.
There are several issues for the Rays playoff attendance. The Rays make you by playoff tickets for the first two rounds. Last year they sat on the second round money for 3 months beforw refunding, I was not going to do that again. They didn't start selling single game tix until afternoon on Monday. I would have picked up the $25 tickets but the Rays are only on TV in lass than half our market due to battles with the cable cos. I was excited to see them on TV finally. Then I wasn't.
No matter how much I liked a team that would be a big nope from me. I'm not giving anyone a big chunk of money for three months until they finally got around to refunding it. Especially if they have a habit of losing early so I most likely wouldn't see the games I paid for anyway.
Teams do some really crappy stuff with playoff money. The Cubs are forcing me to use it toward 2024 season tickets -- I knew this going on -- so not even making a refund an option.
What’s amazing about the Rays is teams usually sell out by selling season ticket holders their playoff tickets AND offering extra strips if season ticket count is low enough.
I wonder how much is general workplace culture? Maybe Minnesota has more jobs that offer time off in the first place, and since the Twins are a bigger deal there than the Rays if someone asks for the afternoon off to go to a baseball game, their boss or supervisor knows what they are talking about and is more likely to okay it. While in Tampa a boss or supervisor may not have even heard they are playing, and definitely isn't going to give the drudge the afternoon off for some stupid game that can't be important if no one else cares about it, either.
No way would the attendance be stellar, even with a night game, but it might be just low instead of pathetically low.
Another thought (because I've done just this) is if fans want to go to a couple playoff games, they don't have the budget for more, so they are skipping the first series to see if the Rays advance and spend their limited playoff dollars on a team that didn't flame out early. I've sometimes skipped the first series because I didn't want to waste my ticket on an early losing series, I wanted to see if the team could advance and then I'd get a ticket for a later round series if they showed a little staying power.
So the Rays ownership wants to change from playing in a half empty crummy ballpark to a half empty luxury stadium. Have to wonder if someone there is reconsidering if St.Pete is really the right place.
Maybe they are planning to do water polo in a few more years!
Well the luxury ballpark in Miami is probably pretty indictive of what will happen in St. Pete l
The twin cities have very different demographics than Tampa, so you're not really comparing apples to oranges. Many of the retirees hereabouts with the money and flexible schedules to attend a 3PM game with little notice are transplants, and likely have allegiance to their hometown teams. For the local Rays fans who are regular folks with jobs and/or kids the median income is considerably less here than in the twin cities so it isn't necessarily as easy to take time off without advanced notice. The road/bridge layouts are not optimal and get very crowded in the afternoons; it's the worst possible time to try to get anywhere. I am a Rays fan from Sarasota, which is about a 40 minute drive in the evenings or weekends, but could easily be two to three times that in the middle of the afternoon. And if there is an accident on one of the major roads and you are stuck on a bridge with no way to bail out and take another route...fuggetaboutit.
That time isn’t just inconvenient it is impossible for most working folks and especially those with children to attend a midweek game at 3PM most especially WITH NO ADVANCED NOTICE. This is 100% on MLB for scheduling that awful time. I’m mad as hell because I would definitely would have gone. Hell, I couldn’t even watch or listen to the game much less attend because I was working. I know many people who would’ve attended if the games were in the evening. I have friends who bought tickets last week as soon as they clinched the spot, and they could not go. The tickets were wasted. I hope (but highly doubt) they can get refunds. There are many Rays fans in my circle, and the few that were able to go at those times couldn't find anyone to go with them because they had to work or their kids were in school.
This is why I take the "if you really loved them you'd be there" with a grain of salt. Sure, but in reality life is complex and things suck and you have to miss stuff!
Basically life happens. If my team was in the playoffs this year, and I had no problem getting time off from work, I wouldn't be able to go because I went to 2 weddings this summer, I redecorated my bedroom and replaced my bed, and my car insurance is due this month, so I don't have an extra cash that I could justify for playoff games and the parking and associated other expenses.
I only have so much I can allocate to "really infrequent expenses" and no matter how much fun a playoff baseball game might be, those dollars have already been used for other things. I think there is not just so much more demand on people's time but also on their budget and it's hard to fit in an extra thing. Which makes me even more sorry for fans who got tickets and WANTED to go but life got in the way and they couldn't make it.
Having playoff games in the afternoon midweek isn't a surprise. Heck, with a 3 PM start you can work half a day and still make it to the stadium for the game.
While I'm not a Florida resident, I've seen 15-20 games at the Trop over the years so I know what the drive from Tampa is like.
Well, 47K people showed up in Minnesota on the same workday at basically the same time WITH NO ADVANCED NOTICE as well.
This isn't the A's whining about low attendance while they're gutting the team and booking moving trucks. Y'all have been in the playoffs for a half decade straight. If Twins fans can fill their park in the exact same situation, the excuses of Rays fans come off as just that - excuses.
Yeah but expectations were higher in MN. There was no way that streak could continue. The Twins were due.
/s
I'm not surprised at the low attendance (in general) as the year-to-year attendance is typically low. But for the postseason, I find it very surprising. Otherwise, I know many Cardinals fans (me included) who have (or would have) taken their kids out of school to go to a playoff game in a hot minute. Same for Redlegs fans, Cubs fans, etc... The lack of advanced notice wasn't a huge issue for the other teams with similar notices (or lack thereof). Here's to hoping the trend doesn't continue Dan. Baseball is better when every team has solid backing.
Having read your comment again...I completely forgot about the number of transplants in the Tampa area. That certainly doesn't help matters. Solid point. Thank you for reminding me.
I’m going to have to disagree with the start time excuse. If the Mets or the Yankees made the playoffs and the game started at 1/2/3/4/5 PM or any time for that matter, it would be sold out, whether there was a day or a weeks notice of the time.
Well, this year, but as much as Mets fans loathe to admit it, the Yankees are usually in the playoffs.
Probably >25 teams would sell out or close to it.
But blaming fans is never a good strategy for the team, players or media.
The Tampa problem may be better related to the amount of transplants, not just in Florida as a whole, but the Tampa/St. Pete area specifically. There are lots of them and unless you are a diehard baseball fan, you’re probably not going to watch the Rays playoff game if you’re from another area and root for your hometown team.
A ten year old kid going to games the first Rays season is now old enough to have her own ten year old to take now. 25 years is a long time to build home town fans.
Except transplants have lived there for that long and continue to move to the area, and in most cases kids root for the same teams as their parents
That seems rather speculative. My guess is that most kids in Florida don’t become Boston or Cleveland or St Louis fans simply because their parents moved from there 30 years ago.
And it doesn’t fit cities like Phoenix or Atlanta that also have massive influx of population.
Nor does it fit the NHL or NFL clubs in Tampa.
This is all speculative - my kids are Mets/Knicks fans no matter how many times I try to steer them away from the misery, who knows for sure, maybe the Shadow ?
Speculative but I'd bet on it, if I were a better. My theory is that there's a continual churn of retirees moving to Florida, enjoying the sun, deceasing, rinse, repeat; hence to built-up loyalties. And these olds don't have 10-year olds.
FWIW, I'm a Yankee fan due to having grown up near NYC in the 80s and 90s, and because my mom was a Yankee fan, though I have lived in PA since 1997.
My 15-year old son is a huge Yankee fan himself - because of me - even though he has only ever lived in Pennsylvania.
As a rule, kids become fans of either
1. the local team
2. a team that's really good when they start following the game, or
3. the team that their parent(s) follow.
So it's entirely possible that young kids in the Tampa area are eschewing the first two of those because they're going with the third, though I imagine that most of the children of transplants to Florida are themselves adults who did not transplant with their retired parents, so I'm not sure how much this would apply.
It does seem like the 3-month escrow factor probably looms large here. As usual, it makes more sense to blame the team than the fans.
Also, football is king there. Though it's also king in Texas and the Rangers and Astros do okay.
The Dolphins games have loads of empty seats.
So what DO Floridians do for entertainment?
Crystal meth.
Debt delinquency in the Tampa/St. Pete metro area is about 30% of the population, or two and a half times that of the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area.
Then move the team. If it can't draw where it is, move it.
The Rays are "built the right way." My annual story here:
Using the Mets & Yankees for this argument isn’t really fair, since there’s a zillion more people in the NYC area than in Tampa/St Pete.
But using the Twins as a comp (as Bill From the Shore did here)? Absolutely valid…
It’s probably most teams, as DLF mentioned, not just the Mets and Yankees
Sure, but the two you picked to make your argument are the two worst possible examples
I guess the argument can now be made you should only have a team in highly populated areas ? Or is it that Tampa fans aren’t really that loyal ? Maybe the weather is to blame ? It’s too nice to go to a game, let’s hit the beach !
Not at all. Just saying it’s silly to compare attendance in Tampa to attendance in NYC.
That said, the Yankees had trouble selling out playoff games last year, and them only getting 47k on a Sunday is WAY more embarrassing than Tampa pulling 20k on a mid-week afternoon
https://www.usatoday.com/story/gameon/2012/10/14/yankee-stadium-crowd-empty-seats-game-2/1633317/
That’s odd, unless what I saw on the internet was wrong, new Yankee stadium has a capacity of 46k and change and it opened in 2009 ? I’m not sure how the math works here, has the seating been reduced since ? Not a yankee fan, so I have no idea.
It’s the game time. No wait. It’s the stadium. No wait. It’s the location. No wait it’s the owners. No wait.
The Rays have had terrible attendance since their first season, and the only thing we can apparently be sure of is that it’s never because of the fans themselves. There’s always another reason.
Ba Ba Ba Ba BINGO !
Actually, by definition it can’t be the fans’ fault, because they are the fanatics in the ball park. It thus must be a non- fans’ issue, which makes it a marketing problem.
Of course, it can't be a confluence of all of those various factors either, in your mind.
Maybe it is. But that would be an indication that perhaps the team shouldn’t have been given to Tampa in the first place.
In hindsight, maybe.
As a fan of the long season, having the NL East and West champions play teams they led by 14 and 16 game’s respectively is surreal. And with the nature of the playoffs, either LAD and/or ATL could easily lose. Oh well. My aesthetic choices don’t control.
...
I don’t follow the Padres closely enough to *really* have an opinion but from my distance, it seems that they would be right to not overreact to a season with such a wild difference between pythag and real wins. Sometimes things break wrong without identifiable cause. Forcing causation can be counterproductive.
Don’t give Manfred any ideas. *MLB announces game differential run leads to start playoff games in 2024*
Like the discussion on the Rays attendance the Padres being much worse than their run differential comes down to a lot of things and Melvin is part of it. At the same time I don’t get firing someone long perceived as a good manager because the “team” had a weird year.
Sure.
And I don't think a manager is binary good vs. bad or even fits along a two-dimensional line between good and bad. I think that every manager has a different skill set that can mesh better or worse with certain types of teams.
I think, for example, Dusty Baker is a great manager, but I don't think he is high on my list to run a very young club of prospects looking to break in.
It could well be that Melvin is a poor fit for this club, but the record - particularly the record in 1 run and extra inning games - would play a very small role in that conclusion.
THANK YOU for mentioning fit. I've been thinking a lot about that. I like Bob Melvin a lot, but just wonder if this isn't the right slot for him. Lots of us in our lives have gotten jobs we are quite capable of, and it's just not with the right organization for whatever reason.
For sure there are bad managers. Lots of guys who managed <2 seasons and never got another chance, though some are circumstances.
But agree on fit. I thought Melvin was awful when he managed the Mariners, but he’s gotten better and been in different situations. Joe Maddon was good for the Cubs for a while, then his stuff didn’t work and totally failed with the Angels. Especially in basketball and football there are a ton of coaches who are good at inspiring underdogs or coming up with creative strategies who don’t work with a highly talented teams. For all the amazing work John Thompson did at Georgetown he was the reason the US lost in the Olympics that one time.
Because of this emergency alert, and the discussion that surrounded it, I took a look at my phone's settings. It's an android that's only a few months old, and it has quite a few options in the emergency alert section, and when I was setting my phone up recently I'd opted to not have sound on these alerts. So I received a pop-up only. There is also a toggle to allow Spanish alerts when available. I have that turned off, but I mention it because some people got the notice in English and Spanish and speculated as to why that was. Anyway, these seem like a lot more options than one used to have, so if you didn't like the outcome of the alert, go in and see what you can control. Things have changed!
I turned all of my alerts off ages ago, but if you are with other people, those alerts are going to come to you anyway. Everyone else tends to leave them alone, and they will all check their phones and tell you that a flood is coming or there was an Amber Alert or, one time, a terrorist is on the loose. That last one is the exact reason I don't like alerts because they can be used for good reasons like warning people about floods or they can cause panic.
Yeah, I like my phone as silent as possible.
I turned off Amber Alerts because I can't envision a scenario where I could ever help. Telling me to look for a Nissan Sentra with a certain license plate isn't going to happen if I'm sitting at home or out to dinner. I don't ever read texts while I'm driving so even in the one case where I might be able to help, I won't be reading it until I'm parked.
I took a look at Tropicana field on a map, and I've seen people talk about this before, but man, that place seems like a pain in the ass to get to. I'm trying to imagine a big venue placed here on Coronado, where you can take the bridge or drive all the way south to IB and it's already bad enough with the military base traffic. This seems like it could be worse. (I'm not making arguments for anything here, just noticing.)
Was in Tampa for work once and thought about taking a taxi over to see the Orioles play at the Trop. Would’ve been $70.
Man!
On the upside it dissuaded me from witnessing in person an early game in the tenure of Mike Gonzalez “closer.”
Thanks, I had blocked that from my memory.
There are a million people in Pinellas County where St. Pete is located and includes Clearwater, Dunedin and many other towns going north. I have been to several games coming from Dunedin where my mother lives and it’s no different from other stadiums I have been been to and is easier than Atlanta, for example. Coming from Tampa there are three different bridges to St. Pete or you can come in on land from the north. It’s not an ideal location but it’s not that bad.
Edit: and Tampa Bay (Hillsborough and Pinellas counties) is not the same thing as Tampa (one city in Tampa Bay)
Is there any mass transit of note? (Atlanta traffic is a wild thing! The one time I went wasn't bad, but I was starting from Dunwoody, not the city center!)
There is not any of note
The NYC baseball teams would be nowhere without the subways. OK, plenty of people drive. But I think the majority take the train. Triply so for the teams at MSG.
I only go to one game a year, since I live just north of Albany. But coming from there driving is by far the most practical way to do it. But they certainly try to incentivize mass transit by charging $40 to park. You'd need to be pretty wealthy to shrug off paying that every time if you were someone who goes all the time.
If you have amazing luck, you can find street parking in the Bronx. (And even though I think the fear of crime in NYC is exaggerated, you still run a risk of your car making its way elsewhere without you.) And you could in theory park at a lot in Flushing and walk from there to Citi Field, but it's not a pleasant walk. (I have done it a few times in broad daylight, and no one else seems to.)
But for me, if I drove, I would just want to avoid the traffic, But traffic is the main reason I quit driving.
Even traveling to the game from a lot of places in Pinellas like Clearwater, Dunedin etc is over a 30 minute drive. And everyone is on the same stretch of I-275 (including Tampa folks) to get to the park. I've seen multiple reports where the Rays have a significantly lower population density within a 30 minute drive from their stadium compared to other similar markets.
Yes, by all means not easy but not as bad as made out to be.
Oh, no a 30 minute drive!
Seriously, am I supposed to interpret that as some remarkable hardship? I know I'm an outlier, living 2.5 hours from my favorite team (and concert venues), but I'd be a full-season season ticket holder for the O's if it only took me 30 minutes each way to get to Camden Yards.
I’ve been there once, many years ago, and unless you live in St. Pete it *is* a pain in the ass to get to
Senators 1.0 win! Yay!
PS Senators 2.0 win. OK, I guess.
PPS No baseball ‘til Saturday? Boo.
Also, my alert went off at 118pm Central. Hopefully all those domestic violence victims who have a hidden second phone didn’t wait until the advertised time of 120pm to turn it off.
2:18pm Eastern for me, and I had similar thoughts.
TWO MINUTES EARLY was trending on twitter for a bit yesterday!
There’s a joke there about that being the title of a biography of someone suffering from PE, but I’m not gonna make it.
I'm laughing because when I got the notification for this, I couldn't see what it was in reference to, and so I interpreted PE as pulmonary embolism and I couldn't quite make sense of what you were joking about.
I will just point out that multiple outlets attempted to reach Melvin yesterday, but he was unavailable to confirm Preller’s comments. He was also given permission to speak to the Giants.
So we’ll see.
Twins radio reported that Yusei Kikuchi had PitchCom installed in his ear before Barrios threw a pitch in the 5th inning. So Bill is right - Barrios wasn't yanked because he walked Royce Lewis to lead things off. He was yanked because the plan all along was to bring in Kikuchi to pitch to two lefties the second time through the lineup. And John Schneider didn't have the whatever to say, "dude has never had better stuff. I'm sticking with him. Let Mark Shapiro yell at me if he wants."
I consider it a very minor victory that none of the playoff rounds are sponsored by gambling companies. Not that the playoffs should be sponsored, but I choose to see the positive. I doubt it will last
Question re. Attendance: Why do the Marlins still draw so few fans. I get the Royals and A's as mentioned above but I don't why the Marlins still have so few funs. Genuinely curious.
Not an easily accessible stadium location for one.
I think a lot of people in that area are still pissed about the way the stadium was financed, and vowed never to attend games there. Gator, what say you?
This is a valid question and there are lots of factors obviously (ownership, stadium location, etc.) but after 30 years I think it's also fair to say that Florida man (and woman) just doesn't care all that much about Rays or Marlins baseball. You'd still hate to see the fans that -are- there lose their team, which is why it's time to bring my idea into play:
Move one of the Florida teams to Nashville. Have the remaining team split their home games between Tampa and Miami. Financial impossibilities aside, this is the best idea.
The Marlins have finished last or next to last half of their seasons. They’ve never won the division. They have 8 winning years out of 31 (and 5 more where they won 79 or 80). They also have done a number of things to generate bad will -- tearing down the team after winning the World Series. I bet if you moved the Yankees to Miami, they’d draw 3 million. It’s the franchise not the city.
The idea that you can drop a BAD MLB team in a city and fans will just show up just doesn’t hold up. I see the same problem in Las Vegas and Nashville, which have other problems as well.
The Marlins made the playoffs (so, ostensibly a good team) this year and also finished 29th in attendance.
They won the world series in 2003. They finished 28th in attendance. In 2004, riding momentum from a title, they finished 26th. Even when the Marlins have been good (which, as you pointed out, is not often!) there just aren't folks coming to the games.
If you moved the Yankees to Miami, they might draw 3 million because they're a brand, but if you moved say the Brewers (a team with largely better on-field results than the Marlins) I think the Miami Brewers would still be bottom 5 in attendance just like the Marlins.
Attendance is a lagging indicator. Setting aside whether the Marlins were actually good this year, fans certainly wouldn't have bought season tickets anticipating the team being good or caught on to the team being in the wild card race until late in the season. Will be interesting to see if a playoff appearance boosts 2024 attendance.
I forget which year the Marlins won the World Series and then traded (what seemed like) all their good players in the off season. That would certainly kill the interest in even a championship team.
We'll agree to disagree, and likely never know, on the Miami Brewers. I think they'd see a significant attendance boost with a team that competes year in and year out. Admittedly the Yankees were a bad example.
1997 - Marlins win World Series, 11th in attendance.
1998 - Marlins tear down and lose 100+ games, 22nd in attendance.
Didn't include these in the original post though because the 1998 tear down was so f-ing ridiculous that I'm not going to ding the market for that. They should have burned down the stadium instead of going to games.
I never got the alert, and I got all three vaccines yesterday as well. Given that I woke up this morning, and looked as scruffy as usual in the mirror, I’m assuming I’m not a zombie.
I am looking forward to my improved 5G.
If you don't feel like a zombie today, you are lucky. The COVID shot usually leaves me feeling meh. Can't speak for RSV yet since I am under 60, but shingles knocked me out completely.
Weird. All the other vax I've gotten nothing but a sore shoulder, except for the second Covid--that kicked my ass, just like a regular flu. hah.
First Covid shot made me angry. I mean, it knocked me out and I had some of the best sleep in my life, but I'm angry that I know that I'm capable of that kind of sleep but have never experienced it again.
I have to wait a bit longer for my nanobot booster and 5G upgrade since my one and only dance with Covid was less than three months ago.