Examining Determinants of Major League Baseball Attendance



Posted: Saturday, July 12, 2008

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Professional baseball's reliance on statistical performance measurements is hardly surreptitious. From batting average with runners in scoring position to strikeouts per nine innings, the game's protracted regular seasons-which consist of over 160 contests per team each year-compel talent evaluators to employ both idyllic and intricate metrics in appraising on-field effectiveness.  It is reasonable to surmise, then, that a measure for predicting stadium turnout also exists for this data-dependent game. 

One may rationally believe, for example, that attendance rates are strongly correlated with winning percentage.  This notion supports the "fair-weather fan" ideal championed by USA Today contributor Tim Wendel in expounding athletic allegiances ("The Rise").  Or perhaps spectators are influenced by a more austere stimulus: money.  In particular, one may presume that fans are more loath to attend Fenway Park, which assessed an average ticket price over $47 in 2007, than Chase Field, a stadium in which onlookers were charged less than $14 per seat in the same season ("Major League").  After performing regression analyses to establish the relationship between attendance figures, on-field success, and ticket prices for each MLB team during the 2005 to 2007 interval, it is clear that neither of the latter two variables significantly influences arena assemblage rates; in short, stadium sojourners' propensities appear swayed by both quantitative and qualitative factors, with no predominant instigator.
 
Before further explicating potential qualitative influences on ballpark turnout, an inspection of the surprisingly trivial relationship between stadium participation and clubs' on-field effectiveness is vital.  To compensate for divergent arena capacities among the thirty MLB teams and utilizing data compiled by ESPN.com and BallparksofBaseball.com, this portion of the study compares the average proportion of occupied stadium capacity to each squad's average quantity of victories for the 2005, 2006, and 2007 regular seasons.  Selected regression results for this comparison are illustrated below.



Multiple R

        0.5636

R Square

        0.3177

Standard Error

        0.1410

F Statistic

        0.0012



Coefficients

Standard Error

  t Stat

P-value

Intercept

   -0.2468

      0.2638

 -0.9356

0.3575

Average Wins

     0.0117

      0.0032

   3.6104

0.0012

As indicated by the R-square value, just 31.77 percent of the variation in MLB stadium attendance over the past three regular seasons is explained by the variation in individual team success.  Although the independent variable's t-value and p-value, 3.6104 and 0.0012, respectively, present contradictory evidence, this model's meager R-squared amount permits one to justifiably claim that the correlation between attendance and wins is negligible.  Put plainly, baseball enthusiasts, despite their perceptible fervor, largely overlooked a given club's success when contemplating whether to participate as a spectator during the emphasized three-season span.  This data convincingly refutes the "win-addiction" syndrome afflicting contemporary sports fans, as enunciated by SportsIllustrated.com author Dave Zirin ("Fickle Fans").

Akin to their indifference to competitive performance, professional baseball onlookers are inclined to disregard the cash outlay associated with each ballpark visit.  The following regression results, constructed incorporating data garnered by ESPN.com and TeamMarketing.com, depict the flaccid connection between attendance rates and average ticket price during the highlighted period.  

Multiple R

    0.6755

R Square

    0.4563

Standard Error

    0.1259

F Statistic

    0.0000

Coefficients

Standard Error

 t Stat

P-value

Intercept

    0.3186

       0.0822

3.8752

 0.0006

Average Ticket Price

    0.0174

       0.0036

4.8472

 0.0000

This regression model indicates that 45.63 percent of the variation in stadium turnout is explained by ticket prices, a quantity that lacks statistical significance.  Similar to the previous model, the independent variable's t- and p-values, complemented by a diminutive F statistic, connote a statistically reliable relationship between the two variables; however, the superlative coefficient of determination indicates that an exiguous correlation exists between grandstand assemblage numbers and average ticket assessments.  Although this model failed to reveal MLB ballpark attendees' primary incitement to enlist as crowd members, it yields evidence that prospective observers heed ticket price values to a greater extent than win totals. 
           
Despite ticket price's relative supremacy to team performance in baseball supporters' cognizance, each measure's futility in expounding MLB arena assemblage figures suggests that other factors, previously overlooked in this analysis, strongly influence prospective spectators' decisions.  For example, franchises' administrative aspects, such as marketing and public relations aptitude, likely sway fans' behavior.  The Boston Red Sox, for instance, now commission social events, such as weddings and bar mitzvahs, within Fenway Park to augment the team's and stadium's "brand" (Batterson).  Moreover, baseball supporters likely heed distinctive stadium characteristics, including locale and amenities, when contemplating participation.  It is the attendance-seeking MLB franchise's task, then, to balance these diverse on- and off-field cogent factors, while remaining both cost-effective and loyal to extant devotees.  But, given that one-third of MLB's clubs possessed average occupied stadium capacity rates below 60 percent over the past three seasons, this endeavor appears simpler to promulgate than properly execute.



References

Ballparks of Baseball. 2008. June 2008 <http://www.ballparksofbaseball.com/>.
Batterson, Mark. "More Than Baseball, Marketing the Park Fenway Transformed As,
      year-round Attraction." Corporate Connecticut. 5 July
      2008 <http://www.corpct.com/editors_picks/fenway/fenway.php>.
"Major League Baseball Fan Cost Index." Team Marketing Report.
       InfinityProSports.Com. June 2008 <http://teammarketing.com/fancost/mlb/>.
"MLB Stats." ESPN. 2008. June-July 2008 <ESPN.com>.
Wendel, Tim. "The Rise of the Fair-Weather Fan." USATODAY.Com. 1 Nov. 2005. June
       July 2008 <http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2005-11-01-fans
       edit_x.htm>.
Zirin, Dave. "Fickle Fans." SI.Com. 25 Oct. 2007. CNN. June-July 2008
       <http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/writers/dave_zirin/10/25/fickle.fan/index.html>.


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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)
» left by Anonymous
 3 years 52 days ago.
This article was exactly what I was looking for!  Great work!
» left by Anonymous 2 years 318 days ago.
Have you been able to find yearly, average tickets prices anywhere?
» left by Alex Masciantonio 2 years 317 days ago.
Yes, refer to the third reference item.
» left by Anonymous 2 years 307 days ago.
You ran simple OLS regressions with one explainitory variable in an attempt to explain the determinants of MLB attendance? You also use R-squared as an explaination of the variables "significance". You probably should have run a panel regression, namely fixed effects to control for unexplained differences in teams. I recently ran a FE regression with a few more explainitory variables and got a very large and statiscically significant win percentage effect on per game attendance.
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