Leaving America's pastime in the past: Baseball's declining popularity

Leaving America’s Pastime in the Past: Baseball’s Declining Popularity

By DYLAN PRUITT S&R Editor

Though it is known as “America’s favorite pastime,” baseball seems to have lost its touch on Americans.

Just last year, the 2018 attendance report from Major League Baseball showed that total numbers were the lowest since 2003. Though there was a 2015 peak in numbers, that is only in reference to the already low numbers prior to that year. Furthermore, since 2015 the MLB has been experiencing an attendance decline for three straight years, with 2019 predicted to continue this trend.

Many have tried to explain this phenomena, with reasoning ranging from rainy weather, to boring games, to picky millenials. At the end of the day, however, there really is no definitive answer for America’s pastime being left in the past.

Since the beginning of the sport, there were claims that it was nothing more than an old man’s sport, with many people disliking the long and slow nature of many games. It seems apparent that even the MLB agrees on this point, since a multitude of rule changes have taken effect in recent years. Conveniently enough, many of these changes coincided with events that had low attendance during the years of decline mentioned previously.

Despite these changes, games still out-time much more popular TV choices like Game of Thrones and Stranger Things in terms of runtime. Whereas one episode of those shows might last around an hour, the longest MLB game in recent history lasted almost three hours.

Though it might be considered unfair to place blame on specific teams for the decline in attendance, Baseball-Reference provides an interesting look at which teams have had the most dramatic decrease in the average number of attendees. The worst offenders in terms of number decreases, the Toronto Blue Jays, saw average attendance go down a considerable 501,090 people. Even the team in tenth place as far as attendance losses go, the Houston Astros, were close to losing an average 100,000 people.

This list provides an interesting perspective, and not because it allows for finger pointing regarding a decline in popularity. Rather, it helps show that there truly is no easy answer as to why attendance has decreased so steadily in recent years. Though many rebuilding teams like the Blue Jays make up the list, there are also well-established and well-positioned teams like the New York Yankees and the aforementioned Astros on the list as well.

The explanation that might, and perhaps should, come to mind is the relatively recent 1994 strike that resulted in the cancellation of the World Series. At the time, the World Series was headed for an all-time record for attendance. Following the strike and subsequent cancellation, attendance didn’t reach heights anywhere close to that level for another decade.

Similarly, the revelations of drug use by Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, and Mark McGwire certainly took a toll on attendance. After all, the ever-popular attempts by these three to chase homerun records by former greats were essentially ruined for many fans after it was discovered that steroids were involved in those efforts.

The best, and perhaps most reasonable, explanation for the decline in attendance for the MLB is noneother than the economy. Since the recession in 2008-2009, the same timeframe in which baseball took its first big hit in attendance, numbers haven’t been the same. Though other sports were also affected, baseball requires a different perspective on economic efforts like the recession. This is due to the fact that, whereas the NFL and NBA can rely on the one-percent and occassional spending from average consumers, the MLB’s higher number of events requires a dependence on repeat customers, something that naturally declined in the recession and never really returned to normal.

Whatever the definitive reason, baseball’s attendance has taken a huge hit recently, and doesn’t seem to be on the recovery just yet.