WP: Nats MASN deal renegotations will have a huge impact

[Smithian]

Absolutely the Nats Park area is one of the best bar scenes in MLB and getting better every year. But if you don't think that the panic caused by the shooting during the game in 2021 when the fan was shot leaving the ballpark affected attendance you are fooling yourself. Not the same impact as the team stinking but there are definitely people who are reluctant to return.

The bar/restaurant scene around Nationals Park is great. Pretty much all you could ask for within a 15 minute walk from the ballpark. Pregame is as good as it gets anywhere.

I do leave the neighborhood pretty quick after games. I got one beer at Atlas after a game last year, started walking down Half St and had a negative experience with an individual, and there were no police nor team paid security around. I'll still go to games, but it's disappointing. It's not a Nationals Park problem, it's a DC problem.

Still, pregame, I love Navy Yard for a ballgame at Nats Park or Audi.

[IanRubbish]

We had the lowest attendance across all of spring training today.  Don't think the light crowd was due to a random shooting incident near Navy Yard.

[Five Banners]

We had the lowest attendance across all of spring training today.  Don't think the light crowd was due to a random shooting incident near Navy Yard.

 It’s still February, and who wants to rush to watch last year’s cellar dweller against the most reviled team out there

[PowerBoater69]

We had the lowest attendance across all of spring training today.  Don't think the light crowd was due to a random shooting incident near Navy Yard.

The Nats had crap attendance at spring training in 2019. Dont think that light crowd was due to a depleted roster.

[imref]

The Nats had crap attendance at spring training in 2019. Dont think that light crowd was due to a depleted roster.

Need to bring back

[Slateman]

The Nats had crap attendance at spring training in 2019. Dont think that light crowd was due to a depleted roster.

Again, coming off a season where we finished with a worse record than the Pirates

[IanRubbish]

As the league weans itself off of cable TV revenue, this is what small market teams will need - a real estate development similar to what some larger market teams have done.   

https://www.kcur.org/news/2022-11-15/royals-ceo-john-sherman-announces-vision-to-build-2-billion-downtown-ballpark-district

[imref]

Teams just need to figure out how to be like the padres.

[IanRubbish]

Teams just need to figure out how to be like the padres.

They have one of the best climates for outdoor baseball, a great walkable surrounding neighborhood, relatively high local wages, and importantly, no NFL.   I think making money off of real estate is going to be essential as the league ultimately moves off of cable TV, especially for small market teams that have local fans putting $ into their NFL teams. 

There are five markets that have NFL and are smaller than Denver - Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Cincinnati, and KC - all are in the bottom seven of payroll along with Oakland and Tampa. 

The Nats are unusual because have small market attendance with big market prices.  Except for the opening series against the Yankees, Baltimore doesn't have a single ticket for sale in April above $75.  The Nats meanwhile are still selling Terra Club for $395.   

https://www.fangraphs.com/roster-resource/breakdowns/payroll

[Natsinpwc]

Teams just need to figure out how to be like the padres.

It’s sports. Everyone cannot win. There are winners and losers.

[HalfSmokes]

They have one of the best climates for outdoor baseball, a great walkable surrounding neighborhood, relatively high local wages, and importantly, no NFL.   I think making money off of real estate is going to be essential as the league ultimately moves off of cable TV, especially for small market teams that have local fans putting $ into their NFL teams. 

There are five markets that have NFL and are smaller than Denver - Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Cincinnati, and KC - all are in the bottom seven of payroll along with Oakland and Tampa. 

The Nats are unusual because have small market attendance with big market prices.  Except for the opening series against the Yankees, Baltimore doesn't have a single ticket for sale in April above $75.  The Nats meanwhile are still selling Terra Club for $395.   

https://www.fangraphs.com/roster-resource/breakdowns/payroll

They also aren't paying the out years yet. There is always a price to pay for 10+ year contracts, they're just in the early years

[PowerBoater69]

The Nats are unusual because have small market attendance with big market prices.  Except for the opening series against the Yankees, Baltimore doesn't have a single ticket for sale in April above $75.  The Nats meanwhile are still selling Terra Club for $395.   

https://www.fangraphs.com/roster-resource/breakdowns/payroll

Small market attendance because the Lerner family prioritized a smaller number of season plan holders paying premium prices vs growing a larger fan base. Leonsis built up the Caps fan base from nothing. With the Lerners it always seemed like plan holders were there to be milked, particularly during the Camillo era.

[welch]

To me, the idea that the Nats get second class treatment from MASN as far as programming goes has always been overblown.  Best I can tell it's an equally terrible product for the O's.

Baltimore's MASN refuses to pay what is owed to the Nats even under the grotesque contract. That is worse than second-class treatment. Even in the mid-'50s, when Hoffberger was given the St. Louis Browns, Baltimore was a smaller and weaker metropolitan area. In 1960 or '61, we counted the numbers from the 1960 census, which were important in civics class because there was a huge fight over re-apportionment in Maryland.

Total, DC area, including Fairfax, Arlington, and Alexandria: about 2 million people

Total, Baltimore City plus Baltimore County: about 1.4 million.

Best guess: Washington was a stronger market than Baltimore when the Orioles dropped in. It has gotten much stronger as Baltimore has faded. The MASN contract is theft.

[imref]

Baltimore's MASN refuses to pay what is owed to the Nats even under the grotesque contract. That is worse than second-class treatment. Even in the mid-'50s, when Hoffberger was given the St. Louis Browns, Baltimore was a smaller and weaker metropolitan area. In 1960 or '61, we counted the numbers from the 1960 census, which were important in civics class because there was a huge fight over re-apportionment in Maryland.

Total, DC area, including Fairfax, Arlington, and Alexandria: about 2 million people

Total, Baltimore City plus Baltimore County: about 1.4 million.

Best guess: Washington was a stronger market than Baltimore when the Orioles dropped in. It has gotten much stronger as Baltimore has faded. The MASN contract is theft.

to be fair,  you'd have to add the columbia MD area to the Baltimore market as well as areas north toward and including Aberdeen.

[HalfSmokes]

to be fair,  you'd have to add the columbia MD area to the Baltimore market as well as areas north toward and including Aberdeen.

Then you'd have to add in PG and MoCo and the disparity would be even wider

[Senatorswin]

Last year the Nats had the 4th most expensive experience of the MLB teams. They had the 5th most expensive ticket prices. Seems to me when the payroll plummets the ticket prices should go down also.

As far as the Padres Manfred says they're going to lose money this year. Some guy on Baltimore sports talk radio went on a long rant yesterday about these huge long term contracts teams are agreeing to now. His thing was it's a bad thing for baseball because at the end of the day the fans will keep paying with higher prices of tickets, parking and concessions. I think that's obvious but at what point is it too much for fans to pay.

[Slateman]

Baltimore is also part of Maryland, which has 6 million people. There are plenty of O's fans outside of Baltimore County. The same cannot be said for Virginia and DC

[Natsinpwc]

Last year the Nats had the 4th most expensive experience of the MLB teams. They had the 5th most expensive ticket prices. Seems to me when the payroll plummets the ticket prices should go down also.

As far as the Padres Manfred says they're going to lose money this year. Some guy on Baltimore sports talk radio went on a long rant yesterday about these huge long term contracts teams are agreeing to now. His thing was it's a bad thing for baseball because at the end of the day the fans will keep paying with higher prices of tickets, parking and concessions. I think that's obvious but at what point is it too much for fans to pay.

It's more about tv rights now and less about attendance. 

[welch]

Baltimore is also part of Maryland, which has 6 million people. There are plenty of O's fans outside of Baltimore County. The same cannot be said for Virginia and DC

You missed the numbers: Washington was bigger in the mid-50s when the Orioles were dropped into the area. Prince George's and Montgomery counties were core Nats' fanbase until the second Washington Senators were Shorted off to Texas. The transplanted Browns were not the team for all of Maryland. When the Expos were moved to DC, the Washington area was much bigger than the Baltimore area.

[IanRubbish]

DC Metro Area is 6.4 million, Baltimore 2.8 million, and the census gives them a county in the Eastern Shore.  DC media market is also 2x as large.   Over 30,000 housing units were permitted in metro DC last year vs. just 6,000 in metro Baltimore.   Stadium revenue is much higher at Nats Park than OPACY due to higher ticket and concession prices, reflecting higher income in the region. 

When I lived in Fairfax County, there were not many O's fans around.  It was a lot of Nats and fans of teams where people grew up.  My son's Little League team did that thing where each kid had to say who their favorite player/team was, it was about 60% Nats/40% Red Sox, Yankees Cubs, etc.

Baltimore is not a viable MLB market at this point, the DC metro area is subsidizing its existence, and the demise of cable TV is going to put additional pressure here.  The Angelos family can't legislate that people move to Baltimore.

[Slateman]

You missed the numbers: Washington was bigger in the mid-50s when the Orioles were dropped into the area. Prince George's and Montgomery counties were core Nats' fanbase until the second Washington Senators were Shorted off to Texas. The transplanted Browns were not the team for all of Maryland. When the Expos were moved to DC, the Washington area was much bigger than the Baltimore area.

Except your including parts of Maryland in the "Baltimore area." And they really arent. Not really. Prince George's and Montgomery counties are no longer "core" parts of the DC baseball fanbase.

[IanRubbish]

Some guy on Baltimore sports talk radio went on a long rant yesterday about these huge long term contracts teams are agreeing to now.

The thing with the Padres is that now that they're the only game in town, they're also getting all the local ad dollars in addition to stadium revenue.  The Baltimore guy's comment reflects the reality that small working class markets like Baltimore are not viable, especially with an NFL team in town.  If I owned a business around Baltimore and needed to reach consumers in that metro area, I'm aligning with the Ravens and paying a premium for that rather than messing around with a team that admits it needs a subsidy due to a small fan base.

One other thing re: San Diego, is they probably do more military promos than the Nats.  Another miss by the Lerners.

[Natsinpwc]

The thing with the Padres is that now that they're the only game in town, they're also getting all the local ad dollars in addition to stadium revenue.  The Baltimore guy's comment reflects the reality that small working class markets like Baltimore are not viable, especially with an NFL team in town.  If I owned a business around Baltimore and needed to reach consumers in that metro area, I'm aligning with the Ravens and paying a premium for that rather than messing around with a team that admits it needs a subsidy due to a small fan base.

One other thing re: San Diego, is they probably do more military promos than the Nats.  Another miss by the Lerners.

Dying city and dying baseball team.  Although the fans they do have will have fun watching the young talent at cheap ticket prices.

[HalfSmokes]

Except your including parts of Maryland in the "Baltimore area." And they really arent. Not really. Prince George's and Montgomery counties are no longer "core" parts of the DC baseball fanbase.

Are you seeing many Os caps in Bethesda these days? I'm not

[Natsinpwc]

Are you seeing many Os caps in Bethesda these days? I'm not

If the Nats keep up like they have been you will see more. Years ago you used to see lots of them even in PWC. I mean the Orioles has a team store in DC.