An excerpt from today’s absolute must-read. Smart stuff in here about what gets people to the ballpark. The Wilpons have learned a new stadium doesn’t work, will sigining Choo?
The first year the star is in town, there’s a bump of around 100,000 fans over the course of the season. That’s a largely negligible increase, just 3.3%, but it’s definitely there. By year 2, though, the guy isn’t bringing anyone new to the stadium. Attendance fluctuations in later years are partially the result of random variation, and partially the result of something we’ll talk about in a bit (the Year 8 sample consisted of only two seasons out of 24).
At a price of $100 million for 100,000 fans, teams are paying about $1,000 per fan, which is almost certainly not worth it.
via Take Me Out to the Ballgame: Attendance in Baseball – Bloomberg Sports.
