It starts with the kids
When you think of how most American sports operate for bringing up the next level of talent, it goes something similar to this. Your son is about to graduate high school and is a major prospect in football. He has had several college football coaches like Urban Meyer, Nick Saban, Lane Kiffin, and Les Miles come and visit him saying how they would love to have him on their team. He selects a college, spends three years at the school, breaks a bunch of records, is rated by Mike Mayock as the top player at his position, and ends up as the fourth pick in the NFL draft. He gets a beautiful 2-year contract worth around $8 or 9 million and makes an immediate impact as the new face of the franchise.
Now let's turn to baseball. Your first son's twin is about to graduate high school and is a major prospect in baseball. Instead of college coaches, he has several scouts from the majors looking to scout him. He ends up getting drafted in the first round of the MLB draft straight out of high school. That's great, isn't it? Wrong! Your son hasn't had a life the past few years because he has been forced to play on a travel team all year around so he can prove to the major league that he can handle a long, grueling season. He's lost his entire social life and as the 10th pick in the MLB draft, it looks like it's going to all pay off. Nope, not yet. He was picked by the Kansas City Royals. Kansas City sounds like a nice destination. But, he's going to play AA ball for a few years with the Northwestern Arkansas Nobodys. So, now it's three years later and your first son just got drafted to the NFL. He will be the face of the franchise this year. Son 2 hasn't had the same luck. He's moved up to AAA with the Omaha Almosts and a trade by the Royals has them holding good depth at his position in the majors. Finally, another two years pass by and son 2 has his opportunity in the majors.
Those two anecdotes are the starting point for the grim future of baseball. Most kids in the U.S. don't want to take the route that has them playing in the minors with the Chattanooga Irrelevants for two years. If a kid has raw talent like a Yasiel Puig, he doesn't play baseball in the U.S. He becomes the next LeBron James because he can be on billboards by the time he's 20. He also gets to keep his social life and doesn't have to give up everything to solely focus on making it in baseball.
Now let's turn to baseball. Your first son's twin is about to graduate high school and is a major prospect in baseball. Instead of college coaches, he has several scouts from the majors looking to scout him. He ends up getting drafted in the first round of the MLB draft straight out of high school. That's great, isn't it? Wrong! Your son hasn't had a life the past few years because he has been forced to play on a travel team all year around so he can prove to the major league that he can handle a long, grueling season. He's lost his entire social life and as the 10th pick in the MLB draft, it looks like it's going to all pay off. Nope, not yet. He was picked by the Kansas City Royals. Kansas City sounds like a nice destination. But, he's going to play AA ball for a few years with the Northwestern Arkansas Nobodys. So, now it's three years later and your first son just got drafted to the NFL. He will be the face of the franchise this year. Son 2 hasn't had the same luck. He's moved up to AAA with the Omaha Almosts and a trade by the Royals has them holding good depth at his position in the majors. Finally, another two years pass by and son 2 has his opportunity in the majors.
Those two anecdotes are the starting point for the grim future of baseball. Most kids in the U.S. don't want to take the route that has them playing in the minors with the Chattanooga Irrelevants for two years. If a kid has raw talent like a Yasiel Puig, he doesn't play baseball in the U.S. He becomes the next LeBron James because he can be on billboards by the time he's 20. He also gets to keep his social life and doesn't have to give up everything to solely focus on making it in baseball.
A.D.D. Generation
It's still those damn kids causing problems! "Baseball is too slow of a sport. I don't have time to sit there for three hours and think strategy." I've said this for the past several years and I'll admit that i'm part of the problem. My generation wasn't raised sitting around the radio listening to the Twilight Zone. All of the 20-somethings were raised on computers, video games and all sorts of technology that makes living life faster. We love sports that are action packed and intense. "Oh wow, he's paralyzed because that linebacker smashed his face in. Awesome!!" Those are the type of things the current generation says. "Wow, going for the sac fly was brilliant strategy," said no one ever in the A.D.D. generation.
Everything about baseball is a turn-off to our current generation. The game is too long and doesn't have enough action. The season is too long and too many games don't mean anything. I think most fans are smart and when they live in cities like Cleveland and Pittsburgh, it's hard to get excited when the team wins 20 out of 25 early on every season and still ends up under .500.
The A.D.D. generation is a "what have you done for me lately" generation. If something isn't constantly at the level people want it to be at, then they leave it behind.
Economic Woes
America isn't as prosperous as it once was. The younger generation is graduating with more college debt than it ever has before and there are less jobs waiting for those kids. So, decisions have to be made. Hmm...I have an extra $100 I can spend in New York City. Should I go attend a concert in Central Park of an music icon? Or maybe I could go to Times Square and just enjoy a day there with some friends. Or I could go to Radio City Music Hall, Coney Island, several zoos, Carnegie Hall, catch the Staten Island Ferry, Ellis Island, Statue of Liberty, the Comedy Cellar, catch a Brooklyn Nets game, a New York Jets game, a New York Giants game, go to the Apollo Theater, the Beacon Theatre, Webster Hall, or a Yankees or Mets game.
I love sports more than most things. I would spend my money at 85% of those places before I went to a baseball game. The numbers say i'm not alone.
2011 - New York Yankees Attendance - 89% of their stadium filled
2012 - New York Yankees Attendance - 87% of their stadium filled
2013 - New York Yankees Attendance - 77% of their stadium filled
The Yankees are trying to sell tickets through GroupOn offers. Nobody wants to go to see one of the leagues most exciting teams play. But Tim...a bunch of their stars are hurt. That's true but not an excuse. It's just a result of the area. There are always 5,000 other things to do in New York City every time the Yankees play a game.
You know where there isn't a ton of stuff to do every night, Milwaukee. They're down almost 4,000 people per game from last season. The entire league is down almost 1,000 people per game and almost a million less people have attended this season compared to this time last year.
Here is the entire team by team list, comparing attendance from this year to last year from baseball-reference.com
The numbers don't show a good future for baseball if it continues this downward trend.
Performance Enhancment
No, this isn't the part of the blog where I give my advice on how to save baseball. This is the part where I talk about how PEDs drove the first dagger into America's Pastime. When you have suspicions that your spouse is cheating on you, there is probably going to be some bumps in the road as you try to find out if it is true or not.
When your closest friends, relatives, and random strangers bring you pictures, videotapes, phone records, text messages and a pile of evidence showing she is cheating on you - you leave her.
That's what baseball did to us. It cheated on us. We were so gullible, though. Did we really think a scrawny, ridiculously quick kid playing with the Pirates could naturally grow into the Hulk when he moved to San Francisco and became the home-run king?
The hints and suspicions were always right there under our noses. We just turned the other cheek. Why? Because baseball was so damn exciting then! Who doesn't want to see McGwire and Sosa battle each other back and forth all year to see who can get to 70 first? People like apparent drama and conflict. Nobody likes real drama and conflict, though. When we get too much drama and conflict it stops being fun. It starts getting annoying. I, along with almost every sports enthusiast I have talked to, feel the same way about the steroid era in baseball. We're all hurt that it happened and that so many people did it, and we're tired of hearing about it.
Most of us have lost faith in baseball ever getting back to being clean. How could we with more and more news coming out everyday about A-Rod and Ryan Braun shopping at Miami's local shady drug store. How can I have faith in the game being legitimate?
I'm an upstanding citizen. I don't have time to deal with shady back-alley deals and cheaters. I want a loyal woman to spend my life with. A legitimate job that pays fair with clean money that they legally earned. I don't want to deal with people who have secret passwords, special knocks and tell me to meet them around back because the police have been patrolling the neighborhood. If the police are patrolling my neighborhood, i'm not worried because i'm not a criminal.
Sorry baseball, you've cheated, become outdated, take way too long to get anything done and today's generation doesn't have time for you. We're going to go watch football, basketball, hockey, golf, tennis, soccer, auto racing. Last year, the World Series averaged a 7.6 through the Nielsen Ratings. Game 2 pulled a 12.2. The Big Bang Theory, Person of Interest, and Two and a Half Men all pulled higher numbers competing with that second game. People will watch literally anything other than baseball. Because we're tired of being lied to, cheated on, and stolen from.
It's been a good ride baseball, but I think you know where the exit is.
No comments:
Post a Comment