The New York Times has a good read about Generation Z and sports. TLDR – they don’t care about sports.
The baseball part is of interest to me.
Does anyone really believe this stuff is working and/or matters? Listen to yourselves…
Major League Baseball is finding success with its YouTube channel. It streams a free “Game of the Week” and created MLB Originals, short videos that have included interviews with the Puerto Rican pop singer Jhay Cortez, reaching women by putting a microphone on softball players for the U.S. team and using animation to explain what happens when a player is traded.
We can argue that back and forth, I personally think it’s hogwash and people lying to themselves, but here’s what’s REALLY TELLING. Pay attention…
M.L.B. officials acknowledge that they may have to modify how baseball is played if the actual sport is going to appeal to a younger audience used to faster moving entertainment. It continues to experiment in its minor leagues with pitch clocks and limits on defensive shifts to make games shorter and more exciting.
“There’s no denying that there is more competition for entertainment, connectivity and mindshare,” Marinak, the strategy officer, said. “We need to tighten and make our product crisper.”
Oh and far as nonsense like using animation to explain trades…here’s the money line from the article.
“There’s always an extra human element in fandom, and that is magic,” he said. “Generation Z is not feeling it. When you try to be something for everyone, it becomes a product for no one.”
That last line is huge. You can keep getting mad at me when I scream about long games and west coast starts and openers but if you lose the ME fanbase, then you’re really going to have nothing.
Baseball IS dying despite what the Baseball Mafia sells you. It will die out with Generation X. The older millennials will keep it on life support but when they pass, baseball will find itself over in the Also Ran corner of the sportsoscape with horse racing, baseball and hockey. I will be dead, so this is someone else’s problem.
