After enduring so many struggles since moving to D.C.’s RFK Stadium in 2005, the Nationals would seem to finally be where they want to be. A beautiful ballpark, highly touted young phenoms in Harper and pitcher Stephen Strasburg, and a 15-9 start to the 2012 season that’s got them in first place. Owner Ted Lerner has also shown fans he’s willing to spend on players, supplementing the young studs with eight-figure veterans like pitcher Edwin Jackson and outfielder Jayson Werth.
And yet, fans in the Capital yawn. A market that lays claim to being baseball’s second-wealthiest and seventh-largest (that’s as it stands on its own, separate from Baltimore…viewed as a combined market, Baltimore-D.C would rank as the fourth-largest) has not been kicked into gear by an improved team dotted with appealing, high-curiosity players. The Nats’ 23,800 a game through their first 12 dates ranks 21st in baseball.
...Also an issue: Nationals Park sits in a lonely industrial spot off the freeway.“There were big redevelopment plans for the area, but the recession put a lot of that on hold” says Shawn McBride, a Senior VP at Ketchum Sports & Entertainment and a former D.C.-area resident for ten years.
Baseball failure is a tradition in Washington – two versions of the Senators (one became the Minnesota Twins in 1961; their replacements became the Texas Rangers in 1972) consistently flopped on the field and at the gate before leaving for greener pastures. When the city was up for an expansion team in 1991, Mayor Sharon Pratt Dixon’s most compelling pitch was: “what is the capital of America without baseball?” The sentiment made sense – all that U.S. history mixing with the national pastime, etc., but the National League turned her down, granting its expansion clubs to Miami and Denver. Yet when MLB was desperate to get the Expos out of Montreal seven years ago, the nation’s capital got another chance. The third time hasn’t been a charm – the Nationals have been consistent attendance laggards whose only real contribution has been to drain fans away from the Baltimore Orioles and providing fun road trips for fans of the Phillies and Mets.
Repoz
Posted: May 03, 2012 at 03:53 PM |
77 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Tags:
nats
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. Guapo Posted: May 03, 2012 at 04:07 PM (#4122804)Also the Nats offense has been god-awful lately.
One problem is getting the considerable black community in metropolitan D.C. interested in baseball again. Washington has a fine Negro League heritage (read "Beyond The Shadow Of The Senators" for proof), but once the Negro Leagues fell by the wayside, neither the Griffiths nor the expansion successors did much with it. (Like George Preston Marshall, the Griffith Senators were reluctant to aggressively sign black players for fear of weakening their large southern-based radio network.) The Nationals need to work hard in the black community to spur interest.
So basically, this article is full of ####.
In any event, the Nationals are likely to set an attendance record if they remain in the race all season. Way too early to suggest the fans will not respond to on-field success.
How well publicized was the fact that Harper was debuting that day? I feel like there was less advance notice than there was with Strasburg's debut (for the obvious comparison, although there's obviously something different about going to a starting pitcher's debut than a position player's).
This. If the team is still playing really well in a couple of months and looks like a legitimate playoff contender, people around here will start jumping on that bandwagon so fast that heads will spin.
EDIT: By the way, the Nationals are outdrawing Tampa by three thousand fans a game. You may possibly have heard of the Rays: first place in the A.L. East with a great team, made the World Series four years ago, made the playoffs three out of the last four seasons...
This, and the not-exactly-ideal location of the ballpark. But I'm pretty sure that we can bet that like every other city in baseball not located in Florida, Washington fans will support their team in proportion to its long range and short range success.
----------------------------------------------
One problem is getting the considerable black community in metropolitan D.C. interested in baseball again. Washington has a fine Negro League heritage (read "Beyond The Shadow Of The Senators" for proof), but once the Negro Leagues fell by the wayside, neither the Griffiths nor the expansion successors did much with it. (Like George Preston Marshall, the Griffith Senators were reluctant to aggressively sign black players for fear of weakening their large southern-based radio network.) The Nationals need to work hard in the black community to spur interest.
I totally agree with you here, but that "reluctant to aggressively sign black players" when applied to George Preston Marshall has got to be one of the politest euphemisms I've ever seen on this site. (smile)
I tuned in after the play and only got the audio (as in literally all I know is that Harper is out for not touching 1st). What happened? A double and he was a bit to eager in getting to second?
EDIT: If so what is that scored as? 9-3 Groundout or something?
Nationals' broadcasters have been delusional with regards to some truly horrific teams. I shudder to think what it will be like if the Nationals don't fade as the season progresses.
On the Upton home run last night where Harper clearly had no idea where the ball was, the PBP guy speculated that Harper was just "deking the runner." There was nobody on base, so unless Harper was just trying to speed up Upton's home run trot, that theory makes no sense.
Might it have been a joke?
Ah, so it ends up being a disappointingly conventional 1-3.
Re: home run. I suppose it's possible Harper was kiddin but if so he really sold it. The clip. He looks genuinely lost and frustrated.
I thought so at first, but then he repeated it. Maybe someone who was watching can weigh in, but it just sounded like he was covering for Harper looking like a deer in the headlights.
Well Harper had already been in the big leagues for a few days - he debuted on the road in LA.
I get the mediocrity and all that, I just would have thought the home debut would have warranted a large walk up crowd just out of curiosity to see this new baseball freak of nature.
Yep, that's right; you'd better get used to it, because this team is only going to get better and is going to be a very good team for the next few years.
I'm fully expecting to see that three year string of Nationals-Rays World Series' starting soon.
Source: B-R PI
This one's dead!
Scratch him off, then.
Give the neighborhood a few years to fill in with housing, restaurants and move. There was virtually nothing but offices nearby when the park opened in 2008, and despite the lackluster economy, considerable progress has been made to the neighborhood. More housing is being built, a Harris Teeter supermarket will open a few blocks from the ballpark in late 2013, and so on. Like the ballclub, it's been a long-term development process.
The neighborhood will certainly see more development, but you've still got two sticking points in its relative isolation from the rest of the developed city, and the problem of weeknight rush hour traffic.** A winning team will take care of most of that, but even from Montgomery County, it's kind of a pain in the butt getting there if you don't live near the Metro.
**The Verizon Center fills up, but that's in a much more central location with easier Metro access from more points, and it's also got a much smaller capacity.
I know Wieters' debut was later in the season, but I was there for that night, and the Yard was electric and full of fans.
If the O's had gotten off to same kind of start with a young club of exciting players, there's no way there aren't more fans turning out.
The traffic issue is one of the many reasons I thought a DC team was a really bad idea. and that's never going to get better. A winning team isn't necessarily going to 'fix' that.
The O's and Nats have identical W-L records, and virtually identical attendance figures (23,517 per game in DC; 23,193 in Charm City). I guess the problem is that Baltimore is winning with old, boring players?
And when Strasburg debuted, Nats stadium had a legitimate playoff atmosphere. I don't know why Harper didn't generate that kind of buzz, maybe because he wasn't performing all that well in the minors, but the DC fans absolutely shown a lot of support for stud prospects coming through the system. Basically everything Harper does on the field elicits a cheer from the crowd. Not showing up in force for a Tuesday night isn't indicative of the fan base's enthusiasm.
Unfortunately not. Carpenter and Santangelo are unabashed homers, of the worst kind. Desmond could airmail a throw 30 feet over the first baseman's head and all they'll talk about is how strong his arm is.
No, but don't overstate - it's metro accessible and walkable from Capitol Hill, and there's plenty of parking (albeit expensive).
1. Redskins kick off rookie minicamp
2. Everything you were wondering about Robert Griffin III's contract
3. Robert Griffin III isn't a sure thing, but his foundation is solid
This, and the not-exactly-ideal location of the ballpark.
No, but don't overstate - it's metro accessible and walkable from Capitol Hill, and there's plenty of parking (albeit expensive).
It's somewhere between the Verizon Center and FedEx in terms of convenience, but on weekday evenings getting there by car from the North can be a mess, what with Rock Creek Parkway inaccessible until after 6:30 and the main North-South arteries jammed with rush hour traffic. I can see why even with sellouts the park doesn't fill up by the time of the first pitch.
The atmosphere was great tonight. Probably my 25th or so Nats game and the first time I've been at Nats Park and felt like I was in a stadium full of people truly invested in the outcome. I'm going back tomorrow.
Let's not go overboard with the Deadskins talk though. The club has been horrid since their last Super Bowl appearance, a generation ago. Yeah, it's good to see the Nats finally receiving a little more attention.
What a bunch of loyal saps! Personally, I change my rooting interests pretty frequently to avoid the embarrassment of rooting for a loser.
Is that you posting under a sockpuppet handle, Peter Angelos? Orioles fans have been telling the world before nearly every season for years about how they're a young club full of exciting players, and yet we're outdrawing you guys.
Why don't you all give it a rest with the whiny little Baltimore persecution complex already and try enjoying the hot start you're off to, like we are down here. Who knows, it just MIGHT even be legitimate this time.
You may socialize with a lower IQ set, but that doesn't describe any Redskin fan I know. There's definitely a lot of excitement around RGIII and what he could eventually be, but I don't know of anyone who thinks he'll immediately lead the Redskins to the super bowl, let alone the playoffs.
The only time in recent memory I've seen Redskins fans buy the hype is with the return of Gibbs, who did lead the team to two playoff appearances in 4 years, but still fell well short of hopes and expectations.
What a bunch of loyal saps! Personally, I change my rooting interests pretty frequently to avoid the embarrassment of rooting for a loser.
Sorry, I guess I should have been more explicit. It's not rooting for the Redskins that makes them suckers. It's investing any of their expectations or money in any team owned by Dan Snyder.
Rooting for the Yankees may be like rooting for Microsoft. And rooting for the Expos or the pre-Strasburg Nats may be an admirable sign of loyalty. But rooting for the Redskins is like rooting for a bank that gives you a free toaster and then charges you 23.5% interest and $10.00 transaction fees.
I think the phrase ought to be "I don't know of anyone who thinks he'll immediately lead the Redskins to the playoffs, let alone the Super Bowl." The idea is that we can 'let alone,' or not talk about, the Super Bowl, because no one even thinks they'll get to the playoffs, and the Super Bowl is harder than the playoffs.
I don't know if it's "socializing with" so much as "hearing on talk radio", if his experience is anything like mine. Did you know RGIII will be a disappointment if the Skins don't make the Super Bowl in the next two years? It was news to me too.
There are a lot of transplants, as well as transients who pass through with the political winds, but that's not an insurmountable problem. Supposedly 60% of the Nationals attendance comes from Northern Virginia, so there is room for growth in DC & MD. Winning regularly will do wonders for attendance.
The biggest demographic factor in DC that affects Nats attendance is that 27% of the DC Metro population is African American, and attracting African American fans to baseball is a problem that's endemic throughout the entire sport from top to bottom. The transient factor is there, but it's never stopped the other three major pro teams from drawing when they had winning teams.
DC is not that big of a city. I doubt they could get much more from within the city than they already do.
Unless one assumes that the problem alluded to in #63 is permanent, about 60% of DC is a mostly untapped market. In any event, the metro area is certainly large enough to support the Nationals, and I think that will be a lot clearer by season's end.
And don't forget about this weekend's ONE-tracking on portions of the Red, Blue, and Orange Lines ... as well as station closures on the Green Line in PG County.
39,496 at today's game. Not bad at all.
What % Phillies fans? I didn't get a good look at either game, so it was hard to tell.
I've been there several times in the last 2 years and 40-50% of the fans were from Philly.
DC isn't that big so 27% of isn't that big is not a whole lot. It isn't like suddenly everybody in DC is going to be buying a ticket to go see the Nationals every single year if they market properly. It will most certainly help them at the turnstiles and with revenue but the realy growth and real revenue potentials lies outside of DC.
DC isn't that big so 27% of isn't that big is not a whole lot. It isn't like suddenly everybody in DC is going to be buying a ticket to go see the Nationals every single year if they market properly. It will most certainly help them at the turnstiles and with revenue but the realy growth and real revenue potentials lies outside of DC.
I'm not exactly sure what that first sentence means, but just to be clear, 27% of the DMV Metro area population is African American. Inside the city limits it's 51%, and in Prince George's County it's 65%. That goes a long way to explaining why such a big percentage of the Nats' attendance comes from Northern Virginia.
Not that this doesn't leave plenty of non-black people to fill up the ballpark for a winning team, but it's still crazy to neglect marketing to 27% of your local population base.
Yes, another helpful suggestion from Sherman's baby brother.
Yes, they are. "Ignite your Natitude" is a little-known secretly encoded catchphrase that actually means "Whites only".
This is a pretty strange geographic distinction to draw.
If Zimmerman & LaRoche come back from the DL this week they could be OK since the'll also have Morse back in June. That assumes the stellar pitching continues.
33,058 at tonight's game.
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main