Bud Selig to get two year extension

[TheCrew]

What growth? Outside of the owners, seriously:

 

Overall attendance is very close to what it was a decade and has dropped 4 straight years.

 

World series ratings are pathetic compared to what they were pre 2000 and the LCS ratings were terrible this past year - down 43% from 2 years prior - not to mention, they aren't even on network TV anymore.

 

I just fail to see the growth you guys are talking about..... especially if you compare to the global growth of the other major sports, MLB has really dropped the ball there.

[TooLiveBrew]

From Wikipedia's Miller Park page:

Miller Park is one of the largest construction projects in Wisconsin history. It was built with $290 million of public funds from a 0.1% sales tax that began January 1, 1996, and is scheduled for retirement upon completion, sometime around 2017.

The total construction cost is estimated at $400M (details inset), with a specific number of $392M referenced within the entry itself. What other tax payer money are you referring to beyond the 0.1% sales tax?

Roughly 75% isn't enough? I believe I remember another $50 million being tacked on there simply because the Brewers didn't have the funds or assets to insure....... or something to that effect - but that figure could be included in the $290 million you posted.

Ok, then I'd hardly call that a screwjob.

[TheCrew]

Ok, then I'd hardly call that a screwjob.

Busch Stadium was 12% taxpayer funded,

Miller Park was 77.5% - Similar market size as well; main difference is Selig didn't have the money - even though he insisted for years upon years that the Brewers needed a new ballpark to SURVIVE in this era with the market size...... at the same time he was saying MLB expanded too quickly in the 90's (while he was commish) and 2 teams may have to up and fold...... was nothing more than a scare tactic. So he forced it on the taxpayers, then turned around and sold and took the profits. At the very least, it shows he's got some questionable morals and probably shouldn't be running a baseball team, let alone all of baseball.

 

Heck, did people forget the Senator who promised to vote against the bill to force it onto the taxpayers - then changed his vote and supported Selig and co - was the first senator recalled in the states history? The taxpayers didn't want to pay $300 million for a new stadium and nearly 10 years later, with the financial mess of this state, the taxpayers shouldn't have had to.

 

Selig, and his current $22 million dollar annual salary, should have paid for the damn stadium himself.

 

[cantball]

What growth? Outside of the owners, seriously:

 

Overall attendance is very close to what it was a decade and has dropped 4 straight years.

 

World series ratings are pathetic compared to what they were pre 2000 and the LCS ratings were terrible this past year - down 43% from 2 years prior - not to mention, they aren't even on network TV anymore.

 

I just fail to see the growth you guys are talking about..... especially if you compare to the global growth of the other major sports, MLB has really dropped the ball there.

At best,you're being disingenuous. Attendance hit its peak in 2007,and shockingly,when the economy bottomed out in 2008,it dropped precipitously.And shockingly again,when it grew from 2010 til this last year,attendance grew once again and was the fifth highest ever.

All TV ratings have dropped across the board,due to DVR,online watching,and generally more viewing options for everyone,but even then,MLB is making more on local cable deals than every other sports,and they have more eyes every night than almost anything else.And if you include the fact that almost every sport has playoffs games on cable,your argument there holds no weight.

If you can't see the game has grown in the last 12 years,I don't have any idea what to tell you besides you're being intentionally obtuse over the .1% sales tax.Which I,and apparently the majority of the Milwaukee market are more than happy to pay in order to keep our team here and be a real city.

 

[TheCrew]

Your correct on one aspect, attendance did end up slightly higher this year than last year - apologies there, everything I had read all season long anticipated that it would be a 4th consecutive year for an attendance drop (not sure where you are getting figures on 2010 - it had dropped that year).

 

That said, the growth is poor when looked at over a decade:

2000 MLB attendance: 72,702,420

2011 MLB attendance: 73,451,522

 

Many teams with a long history - including ones with a long history such as Cleveland - have set new marks for the lowest attendance at a single game over the past 24 months. That's not a sign of growth - let's also not forget that a number of new stadiums have opened in the past decade and the attendance numbers have benefited from that.

 

Good for MLB owners that they are making more on local cable deals....... but how are local cable deals a step forward from national network TV broadcasts? MLB LCS games were on network television - they aren't now, it's moving backwards. Whereas other sports are now getting nearly just as much network time if not more.

 

Sports ratings are also not down across the board either - that is just flat our wrong on every level. NFL numbers are up massively and have been at historic levels over the past 2 years, heck Fox's NFL pregame show had a bigger overnight rating than any of TBS' MLB playoff games this past year. Not sure if you saw this past weekend, but that Broncos/Steelers game was the single most watched thing on TV since........... Super Bowl XLV, which by the way was the single most-watched program (not just sports event) in the history of US television.

 

Want to get away from the NFL? While the season is early, NBA tv ratings are up from a quick google search and I know from prior research that NHL tv ratings are up as well. Bottom line is that none of these sports finals (nba finals, stanley cup or superbowl) have experienced the massive decline in ratings that the world series has from the mid 1990's to now, NBA is the only one that has actually declined and that's almost expected in the post-Jordan era.

 

Also FWIW, I actually do not have an issue with the tax itself - the manner in which Selig conducted himself in obtaining the new stadium is what I have an issue with; and apparently a large number of people did as well since the first Senator in the states history was recalled over his support of the tax bill itself.

[RightFieldCoder]

Here's what I think happened with the stadium.

 

Selig knew he was going to be commissioner and needed to sell the team. If he sold the team in the mid 90's, you were pretty much guaranteeing the new owner would push to move the team. He needed a new stadium to lock the next owner to the city. I don't know enough about the Brewers finances to know whether they could have gotten a loan for a new stadium. It's possible that banks weren't willing to lend money to such a small market team that didn't show signs of turning profits. It's also harder to sell an entity that has massive debt. This led him to realize he needed the city/county/state to pay for the stadium. We also have a history of building stadiums. County Stadium was built before we had assurances we would have a team to play there. The only questionable part of the deal is why it is not the county's property.

 

Once the stadium was built he wanted to increase the value. His daughter tried to build a winner, but she failed horribly. They then realized they can increase value by lowering the debt. The easiest way to lower debt was to not have any player contracts on the books. I think Payne resigned because he found out about this plan. Our payroll in 04 was practically nothing. This meant the new owner could come in to a team friendly stadium deal and build the team the way he wanted. This made it far easier to find a potential buyer. And Selig would be guaranteed that the Brewers would continue to play in Milwaukee.

 

I'll admit that one of the underlying threads this whole process is that Selig wanted to make as much money as possible from the sale. If you want to hate him for doing this, I can't stop you. But he could have made a back room deal that would have been worse. He could have found a buyer in the 90s and increased the sale price by using his position as commissioner to allow a move before the sale. He wanted to make money (like you, me, Fielder, or everyone else in the world) but he also cared about the city and keeping it a Major League city.

[Ennder]

NFL numbers are up massively and have been at historic levels over the past 2 years, heck Fox's NFL pregame show had a bigger overnight rating than any of TBS' MLB playoff games this past year

 

Well you can blame baseball for going to TBS for this, that is a ratings killer. But football viewing isn't really up overall, the Sunday night game is a huge draw but the ratings of the rest of the games are down. A lot of people watch baseball on their computers these days as well and I'm not sure how you can track something like that. The sport is certainly healthy enough now. I don't think MLB will ever be able to match NFL because NFL is built for TV and MLB isn't. NFL bunches up its games and has a shorter season, much more fan friendly.

[TheCrew]

Well you can blame baseball for going to TBS for this, that is a ratings killer. But football viewing isn't really up overall, the Sunday night game is a huge draw but the ratings of the rest of the games are down. A lot of people watch baseball on their computers these days as well and I'm not sure how you can track something like that. The sport is certainly healthy enough now. I don't think MLB will ever be able to match NFL because NFL is built for TV and MLB isn't. NFL bunches up its games and has a shorter season, much more fan friendly.

NFL ratings - : http://content.usatoday.c...tings-juggernaut-rolls/1

 

From another article: According to The Nielsen Company, the 2011 regular season reached more

than 200 million unique viewers. NFL games were watched by an average of

17.5 million viewers -- the NFL’s second highest viewership average

since 1989 (17.9 million in 2010), before the explosion of viewer choice

on television and online. NFL games accounted for 23 of the 25

most-watched TV shows among all programming and the 16 most-watched

shows on cable last fall. In addition, a record 37 NFL game telecasts

averaged at least 20 million viewers – topping the previous mark set

last year (35) and up from 16 in 2006.

 

NFL accounted for 92% of the top 25 watched shows in 2011 - damn impressive.

 

People can watch the NFL online and on their phones as well - DirectTV offers packages for this as well; it isn't exclusive to MLB and that info can easily be tracked. I also don't buy the MLB isn't built for TV excuse - really reaching there - if that were the case, MLB would have never had success in the first place. Are the NHL and NBA more built for tv?

 

I'll ask again, what growth?

[TheCrew]

I'll admit that one of the underlying threads this whole process is that Selig wanted to make as much money as possible from the sale. If you want to hate him for doing this, I can't stop you. But he could have made a back room deal that would have been worse. He could have found a buyer in the 90s and increased the sale price by using his position as commissioner to allow a move before the sale. He wanted to make money (like you, me, Fielder, or everyone else in the world) but he also cared about the city and keeping it a Major League city.

Solid write up on it here: http://baseball.derekmiller.us/miller.html

 

Was a shady deal, especially when you consider tax payers were originally to pay $160 million and Selig was supposed to pay $90 but when it's all said and done, Selig pays a bit more than $100 million and the taxpayers pay $290 million...... and if you read the article above, you'll see that Selig really didn't even put his own money up, but even if he did I'm sure it would have been easy knowing he was going to make a cool profit after the stadium was built when he went and sold.

 

I have zero problem with his ambition to make money - but he was extremely deceptive to the people of wisconsin and basically used them to pocket proceeds. If you want to believe he did that to keep the Brewers in WI, that's fine - I don't. I think he saw an opportunity to make a lot of money on a shady deal and get away with it.

[Baldkin]

I'll ask again, what growth?

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/haupert.mlb

http://eh.net/files/graphics/encyclopedia/haupert.mlb.image001.gif

 

Oh, and bringing the doom and gloom is completely ignoring context with regards to growth and viewership.

 

http://aol.sportingnews.com/mlb/story/2011-10-21/world-series-tv-ratings-fox-abc-modern-family-st-louis-cardinals-texas-rangers

 

 

What they completely ignore is context. The 1971 World Series was

the eighth-highest rated show that year. You know what the eighth-rated

show was in 2010?

 

 

The World Series. Yep, that ratings clunker between the Giants and Rangers.

 

 

If you're comparing anything to the NFL and its 16 game & single game playoff format, you're going to lose. Handily.

[TheCrew]

Again, what growth - all I see is more money in pockets of owners and players. That isn't growth - it's greed.

 

The 8th rated shows in 2010 was not the world series - flat out incorrect: http://blog.nielsen.com/n...10s-and-trends-for-2010/

 

The 2010 world series was, however, tied for the lowest rated ever: http://sports.espn.go.com...10/news/story?id=5757137

 

As for the NFL - that's why I also brought the NBA and NHL into it in a previous post. I'll say it again, no other major sports finals has experienced the massive decline in TV ratings that the world series has - take a look here: http://tvbythenumbers.zap...d-series-ratings/107541/

 

1971 looks a lot better.............

[Buckhunts]

What changes would you make? Keep in mind you have to get all the big market and small market owners to agree first and then get the approval of that little organzation call the MLBPA.

[TheCrew]

At this time, the immediate changes I'd make:

- World series home field advantage changed to team with best playoff record going into world series

- Get rid of the 1 game playoff series for the expanded playoffs immediately. I'm not against expanding the playoffs but a 1 game playoff - after a 162 game season - is insanity.

- Institute a better method of instant replay

- Drop the WBC and push for the 2016 Olympics: do whatever you can to support it, skip the all star game that year and encourage the games best to participate. I think most casual fans would love to see the games best competing on an olympic level and would do a great deal to renew fan interest on a national level - not to mention, subjecting the games best to olympic testing may increase fan support/belief that baseball is clean.

[DHonks]

World Series home field advantage cannot go to the team with the best record because of logistics with scheduling months in advance (that's the usual argument). Heck, the best "playoff" record is stupid, because it's not about winning or losing games in the playoffs, it's about winning series.

 

the instant replay is fine, it just needs tweaking. At least it's not a joke like the NFL where they have many cameras and still can't get many right, due to the league's desire to not have booth replays or limiting challenges (case in point, how the Lions got screwed several times against the Packers). The drama of the coach's challenging plays is made for TV, but is terrible when at a game and leads to all sorts of problems. Plus, I like being able to %*%+% about how the umpires screwed us....makes me feel better than complaining about my team.

 

How does skipping the allstar game (3 day break) affect the Olympics (roughly 10-20 day break needed)? The Olympics are a joke for baseball. The WBC has been a great event, and the Olympics don't want baseball because all the power on the IOC rests in Europe, not in Latin America, North America, Australia, or Southeast Asia. If you are shooting for the Olympics, I'd get teams to commit to sending their top prospects or do it by invitation only, like the 2000 winners.

[Ennder]

People can watch the NFL online and on their phones as well - DirectTV offers packages for this as well; it isn't exclusive to MLB and that info can easily be tracked. I also don't buy the MLB isn't built for TV excuse - really reaching there - if that were the case, MLB would have never had success in the first place. Are the NHL and NBA more built for tv?

 

I think you missed what I was trying to say or I said it poorly. I watch all kinds of NFL games that aren't the Packers just because they are on Sundays, it is convienent to watch, they have games on every weekend from out of my market and I can follow almost the entire league in 1 day. The season is also relatively short so I tend to do my best to watch every Packers game I can though i still miss some.

 

I'm a much bigger Brewers fan than I am a Packers fan. I don't really watch other baseball games very much because the timing is almost always bad. I used to watch a ton but only because I had MLB.TV, which is really something I don't need at all to be able to watch football. I watch maybe 1/3 of the Brewers games because there are just so many games and I'm so busy I can't hope to watch much more than that. I still spend a good 5+ times as much of time per year paying attention to baseball than I do football even with all that and in the end baseball has lower ratings from my viewership than NFL does.

 

While the NFL might not have developed the league specifically to suit TV ratings the end result is the sport is perfectly built for TV ratings. The low number of games mean people don't want to miss them, the bunched up games mean people will watch them and the fact the games are mostly during the dead part of the week means I have time to watch them. TV ratings is going to be a terrible way to compare sports in general and it certainly is a terrible way to judge a sports growth since more and more viewers are being pushed away from TV.

 

This bleeds into the World Series and Super Bowl too. The World Series is so inconvienent to watch that even though I'm a huge baseball fan I tend to miss half of it. The Super Bowl has become such an event that unless the Packers are playing 90% of the people at the party I go to generally don't even watch the game, but everyone I know has it on, it is just another reason to have a party. NFL is just the perfect package for TV viewing. The NFL could be run by slackjawed yokels and put a terrible product on the field and still have better ratings than MLB, there isn't anything baseball can do about it.

[JohnBriggs12]

Baseball is making the same mistake Penn State did. No matter how well a guy did in his job, eventually he's too old and will start cutting corners including not keep tabs on his subordinates. He'll also start assuming it's his job for life and he can do anything he wants.

 

That's way too much power for a guy who'll be in his late 70's

[Ennder]

NFL ratings are up because of Sunday night games and Tim Tebow. The rest of the games are down compared to last year. Monday night ratings were down 10% this year as an example. NFL is still extremely healthy but lets at least be realistic about it.

[TheCrew]

It's why I also brought up increased NHL and NBA ratings - it's why I pointed out the finals ratings of all sports....... Heck the Women's Fifa World Cup finals (13.5 million viewers) had similar tv ratings to games 1-5 of this past world series!!!!

 

Do you really think cherry picking the Monday Night Football game numbers is realistic? Let me ask you this, if it stays that way and numbers dip the next 2 years - do you think the NFL will sit back and let it continue to drop, or try out different things to give it a ratings boost?

 

That's the difference. If you can't see that, then so be it. Some people need to take a step back and look at the big picture and stop making excuses for Baseball/Selig - Selig refuses to listen to fans, refuses to accept accountability for any of his mistakes and IMO is slowly letting the sport die in the US (I stress slowly - I know many of us are diehard baseball fans) while lining his own pocket and the pockets of the owners. Record profits for the owners..... but ticket prices are still going up in this economy.... even when the tax payers are paying for the damn stadium in some cases?!?!?!

[Buckhunts]

It is point less to compare tv ratings for baseball to any of the other major sports. The number of games simply does not generate the same amount of interest on a daily basis as footbal or basketball or hockey does. Crew, you keep talking about the owners and selig lining their pockets and I am not sure why. Baseball is the most affordable option of the major sports and it is because the teams are being run like they should be...a business. Why should they lower the ticket prices when most people are willing to pay that price? This idea that baseball is a monopoly needs to die. Baseball is entertainment and as such competes against all other forms of entertain, sports or not. I get the feeling you think Selig has this power to do or change whatever he wants without any sort of backlash. Is he perfect...no. But find me a commissioner who has done more good in the past 7 years. I'm not ignoring the fist decade if his commissionership but clearly it could not have been all that bad considerin baseball is where it is today.

[TheCrew]

Where is baseball today? The only growth anyone can show is financial success for owners and players.

 

I'd take the commish of any other sports league over Selig - previously I would have said he's better than Bettman (NHL) by a hair......... but considering that Bettman's much criticized moved to Outdoor Life Network (OLN) has morphed into into NBC Sports Channel....... NHL is going in the right direction.

 

17 MLB teams had less than 65% attendance this past season - Not a single team in any of the other 3 major sports had below 65%. Still think it's wise to increase ticket prices at the rate they have?

[Buckhunts]

You cannot compare attendance from baseball, a sport that literally plays almost twice as many games as bothb the NBA and the NHL and plays in arena and venues that hold at most 18k to 20k per game. Ofcourse some of the teams will be below 65%. Most of those teams either suck or play in venues that are terrible. The bucks averaged about 13k in a building that holds 18k. That is slightly above 65% and I know for a fact that attendance number is high.

 

It boils down to this. Baseball is attendance is at some of the highest levels in history. Which means more revenue for the teams, higher sponsorship dollars, higher salary for players and a better overall product. Did the owners make money in the process, yes, but that is only because they are running a business. The changes he has helped institute have been nothing but good. The only thing that I would like to change at this point is who get home field advantage in the series.it should be the team with the best overall record during the season, I understand that until you had realignment that wasn't really a feasible solution. However the system we have now is no worse then switching like they did in the past.

 

In the end I think selig has been a great commissioner and will be inducted into the hall of fame (deservingly so). If people want to disagree with me, fine. But unless some crazy reports come out about him, me opinion is not going to change.

[Baldkin]

17 MLB teams had less than 65% attendance this past season - Not a single team in any of the other 3 major sports had below 65%. Still think it's wise to increase ticket prices at the rate they have?

Baseball teams also averaged over 2M per team, and even the lowest attended team had 175% of the highest attended of any other sport.

I can make my numbers do fun things too.

 

In 2003, MLB had a total of 67,688,994. In 2011 that total came up to 73,451,522. That's an 8.5% increase. That is legitimate growth. They have higher viewership numbers than ever before, larger TV contracts than ever before. I don't understand what sort of growth you are expecting, 'Crew.

 

Do you expect them to lower ticket prices so you can go to more games because attendance is so high?

[TheCrew]

You cannot compare attendance from baseball, a sport that literally plays almost twice as many games as bothb the NBA and the NHL and plays in arena and venues that hold at most 18k to 20k per game. Ofcourse some of the teams will be below 65%. Most of those teams either suck or play in venues that are terrible. The bucks averaged about 13k in a building that holds 18k. That is slightly above 65% and I know for a fact that attendance number is high.

 

It boils down to this. Baseball is attendance is at some of the highest levels in history. Which means more revenue for the teams, higher sponsorship dollars, higher salary for players and a better overall product. Did the owners make money in the process, yes, but that is only because they are running a business. The changes he has helped institute have been nothing but good. The only thing that I would like to change at this point is who get home field advantage in the series.it should be the team with the best overall record during the season, I understand that until you had realignment that wasn't really a feasible solution. However the system we have now is no worse then switching like they did in the past.

 

In the end I think selig has been a great commissioner and will be inducted into the hall of fame (deservingly so). If people want to disagree with me, fine. But unless some crazy reports come out about him, me opinion is not going to change.

First I can't compare the TV ratings because baseball isn't built for TV, now I can't compare the attendance.......... is baseball so unique that it can't be compared to any other sport?

 

Look, I have zero issues with the owners making money - you missed my point there - my concern is the sport isn't growing in popularity, the youth of the country has very little interest in baseball. FWIW, Bucks averaged over 80% last year - should really look into the numbers I've posted, I've been pretty fair in this comparison and it's why I've brought sports other than the NFL into this debate.

[TheCrew]

Baseball teams also averaged over 2M per team, and even the lowest attended team had 175% of the highest attended of any other sport.

I can make my numbers do fun things too.

 

In 2003, MLB had a total of 67,688,994. In 2011 that total came up to 73,451,522. That's an 8.5% increase. That is legitimate growth. They have higher viewership numbers than ever before, larger TV contracts than ever before. I don't understand what sort of growth you are expecting, 'Crew.

 

Do you expect them to lower ticket prices so you can go to more games because attendance is so high?

I go to plenty of games, thank you - debate really has nothing to do with my personal views.

 

Comparing overall attendance numbers? Really makes absolutely no sense to do that - a far better barometer is % of the stadium filled and MLB struggles (putting it VERY mildly) to get people to come to baseball games. Even really bad teams in other sports - winless Lions a few years ago still had 85% - do a good job at getting fans in the seats.

 

You may also want to check your facts, been well established in this debate that viewership numbers are no where close to what they used to be and certainly are not higher than ever before.