Submitted by BoMcCready t3_117868y in dataisbeautiful
Comments
Minneapolis_W t1_j9arjki wrote
Might also have to do with the sheer volume of games. MLB teams have 81 home games per year, vs 41 for NBA and NHL, 17 for MLS and 8-9 for NFL. If your local MLB team isn’t a) fantastic and competing for a championship and/or b) woven into the fabric of the city (Boston, Yankees) it’s a tough sell to get people to spend a third of their summer days/nights going to the park.
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9asyug wrote
So total tickets per season attendance MLB will be the highest. By far
Minneapolis_W t1_j9auhth wrote
Yes, by an enormous margin.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attendance_figures_at_domestic_professional_sports_leagues
2019 saw about 68M in total MLB attendance, 22M for NHL, 22M for NBA, 17M for NFL and 10M for MLS.
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9auyfv wrote
Thanks. So it really is America's game.
"Why is baseball called America's pastime? This is because baseball is the sport that generations have grown up playing. From the Industrial Revolution to the Cold War to our present day, baseball has survived countless economic endeavors and national hardships. To say it very simply, baseball has survived the test of time"
Psycho_Sentinal t1_j9bt1q1 wrote
Counterpoint: while MLB has the highest total it is no longer “The Sport” and the NFL has taken over in cultural significance.
For example the MLB World Series avg viewership for 2022 was about 12 million. The average viewership for a Regular Season NFL game is 17 million.
So more people watch NFL games that may or may not be competing for playoff seeding or have the best teams in the league/be in the best time slots or even broadcasted nationally. The World Series is a national broadcast and still falls short.
There is a reason why the tv rights for the NFL dominate every other league. More people care to spend their time watching games. And any game for the NFL when compared to the playoffs or championship of other sports.
ZarafFaraz t1_j9bomw5 wrote
It's funny how it's also Japan's national sport.
RelativeAssistant923 t1_j9br476 wrote
No, it is not "America's game". It is third in TV viewership, third in self identified fan interest, and second in overall revenue. It's also declining: only 25% of sports fans under the age of 25 say they follow it (https://www.statista.com/chart/15869/favrotie-sports-league/) and attendance is down 14% since 2007 (https://www.thescore.com/mlb/news/2387447)
Spaticles t1_j9c8zoe wrote
But how does that compare to previous generations? People who were 25 in 1960 may have also had 25% interest, but by the time that generation was 50, they could have gone up in interest. It's an old man's game.
RelativeAssistant923 t1_j9cs6p3 wrote
I dont know that that data exists, but its far from the only evidence of baseball's decline.
social_media_suxs t1_j9dyfj8 wrote
The big issue with viewership are RSN contracts requiring cable subscriptions at a time when people are ditching cable. It's a huge problem MLB is now looking to fix.
Recent example being Dodgers games having a multi-year blackout in their own home market. https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/dodgers-tv-blackout-is-finally-over-for-some-fans-in-southern-california/
RelativeAssistant923 t1_j9exk09 wrote
I mean, yes, this is a problem with sports generally (although the NBA is doing better than others). But in terms of whether it's "America's game", MLB has never had the viewership revenue that the NFL has right now.
fatamSC2 t1_j9cg14u wrote
NFL is more popular these days. If you went back a few decades there's more of an argument for the MLB and even the NBA in the Jordan era but these days NFL is king and its not even all that close anymore.
el_basopsid t1_j9cz2sj wrote
The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball.
America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time.
This field, this game-it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again.
Ohhhhhhhh, people will come, Ray. People will most definitely come.
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Augen76 t1_j9b2c59 wrote
In Cincinnati the Reds (the oldest baseball team) are absolutely woven into the fabric and have a gorgeous stadium in a great location.
Issue is there is no hope, not only have they been terrible for a while, the mood is they will not win another championship anytime soon.
They are lucky to have loyal fans and sponsors they do, because I know I and so many others are going to the ballpark less and less.
Kirbymonic t1_j9bnswx wrote
Living in Cincy, the bengals being good the past couple years has really made the city come alive. I wonder if the Reds making a similar run would be even more of a stimulant for the city.
Augen76 t1_j9bpve4 wrote
I think so, it is a city that is crying out for a win from its sports teams.
Speaking of which, I'm so pumped for FC Cincinnati home opener this Saturday!
SeriousPuppet t1_j9e8iwm wrote
The Univ is doing well too. Aren't they joining the Big 12?
BoMcCready OP t1_j9ak59c wrote
That's a great question! I'd also note that baseball continues adjusting its rules to improve watchability/pace of play, which isn't something you've seen much in other leagues. I enjoy baseball but I understand why it's a hard sell and attendance has been declining for years.
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9aljzs wrote
Average game for MBL and NFL is around 3+ hours.
Now test cricket can be 5 days with 8 to 9 hours per day. Sometimes those stadiums are packed the whole time.
NarcissusLovesEcho t1_j9arijh wrote
But aren't test cricket matches usually pretty important? MLB teams play 162 games per season and relatively few of these games have serious implications. I love baseball, but even I usually have it on in the background while I'm doing other things. The slowness of the game and the fact that it really doesn't matter too much whether my team wins or loses any particular game suits me. But I can see why the average person is going to have a hard time getting into it at all.
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9asm26 wrote
Yes you are right. Test matches are international matches and each country will play 8 to 12 per year. Only half at home on average.
LordRobin------RM t1_j9c7yll wrote
Sometimes? Maybe? But whenever I see test cricket on ESPN+, the stadium usually looks abandoned. There's no shortage of "test cricket is doomed" articles to be found on the web, and the ICC has even tossed around the idea of shortening the match time limit from 5 to 4 or even 3 days to add a sense of urgency and more aggressive play.
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Poincare_Confection t1_j9b8hxr wrote
It's explained by supply vs demand.
Baseball has 162 games per season. No other sport on this list comes close to that. Next highest is NHL and NBA at 82 games. Baseball stadiums also have relatively high max capacity as you can see.
Twice as many games as NBA and twice as much max capacity explain the bigger gap between avg attendance and max capacity. What ends up happening is that there are so many games and seats that fans pick and choose the "best" games to attend (with best opponents). In NBA seats are so scarce that you just pick whatever you can afford.
RelativeAssistant923 t1_j9broy0 wrote
The NBA is also very willing to charge a ton of money for tickets in a half full stadium.
Poincare_Confection t1_j9bza2x wrote
Well, the data here shows they almost always fill their stadiums. Average attendance is 91% of average max capacity. That's insanely good. Means almost every NBA game is sold out.
RelativeAssistant923 t1_j9csfz1 wrote
Maybe I'm only going to unpopular teams? Or maybe there's a big gap between tickets sold and button in seats? I've gotten some very expensive tickets for half empty stadiums in multiple cities.
Irishknife t1_j9ay6hz wrote
Probably both but also the availability as well. If you're from Kansas City and want to catch a royals game, you have 81 opportunities when your team is playing at home. You have loads of chances. If you're trying to catch a chiefs game, you only have 8 or 9 for the regular season. I am surpried the NBA doesnt have more seats though. Would have thought they'd be in the 30k+ range.
VeseliM t1_j9b5krb wrote
Most arenas cap out at 20-25k seats. Even new stadiums are being built with that capacity.
TArzate5 t1_j9b7nsz wrote
Basketball arenas are really small compared to football, baseball, and soccer stadiums
fatamSC2 t1_j9cglgp wrote
NBA isn't nearly as popular as it used to be. Things have taken a downward turn even more in the last few years. I mean, they're still making money but the game isn't nearly as popular (adjusted for population/inflation/etc) as it was in the 90s
NotJuniorBridgeman t1_j9dgk09 wrote
That’s due in part to Michael Jordan and the inexorable wheel of time.
SeriousPuppet t1_j9e8ofg wrote
Interesting. It seems to be quite popular amongst the younger generations.
Also, I wonder how much soccer has taken from the other sports in terms of eyeballs. It has been growing the past 30 years.
Gsogso123 t1_j9d7j6j wrote
Biggest disparity across the board is that NFL and MLB games are in much larger stadiums, some NFL teams are played in domes but they are much larger than NFL and NHL stadiums.
itsniickgeo t1_j9cbftp wrote
Baseball is not as popular as it used to be, but still has higher average attendance than most of the other sports
TheUpperHand t1_j9al1mp wrote
Each NFL team has only 8-9 regular season home games per year so their product is at a premium. The other leagues have between 2 and 10 times as many. I wonder if the attendance would be as high if there were more games.
Irishknife t1_j9ayrvg wrote
probably would be lower but so would the quality. players already experience lifelong head injuries from the limited play already. imagine 4 to 5 games a week.
TargetMost8136 t1_j9bik8y wrote
I think overall most teams would stay the same if there were more games, with the exception of the handful of teams that struggle to always sell out every seat. NFL tickets are generally in high demand
SeriousPuppet t1_j9e8sgz wrote
I find it so bizarre that NFL has 8-9 home games and MLB has 81. That makes no sense to me. I mean I know why it is based on the history... but still it sounds bizarre. I have always thought MLB plays too many games.
Ravens1112003 t1_j9be1ki wrote
I don’t think so. That’s what makes football so good. Every game means something. I didn’t like it when they added a 17th regular season game, just as I didn’t like it when they added a playoff team. The scarcity is what makes it good.
JenzBrodsky t1_j9amz3o wrote
Needs number of regular season games
Advanced_Book7782 t1_j9anvhz wrote
Yeah, it seems total home attendance per season would make more sense.
Artistic-Breadfruit9 t1_j9az3ng wrote
Especially as a percentage of available seats per season.
GullibleAudience6071 t1_j9e3fxr wrote
My home teams (bulls and Hawks play at the same stadium, United center) The bulls have 41 home games per season (963,500 seats) while the black hawks have 41 (963,500) compare that to the bears at soldier field with six home games (only 504,000 seats)
[deleted] t1_j9et3jh wrote
The Blackhawks don't play every game in Chicago. No different than the NBA.
GullibleAudience6071 t1_j9f06wp wrote
I’m sorry, I just pulled the first thing off the internet last night.
JenzBrodsky t1_j9bbprq wrote
I think just # of games as a relative guage. Next would be avg ticket price. Can't expect people to have the same amount of time and money for each sport, which are not mutually exclusive.
vtTownie t1_j9cdu20 wrote
Ya though weekend MLB series single game ticket costs can rival those of NFL
areappreciated t1_j9c47b1 wrote
+1. Using the average per team, Baseball averages 3.4M attendence per team across 150+ games. NFL averages 1M across 17 games.
Would be interested to see if average NFL ticket prize is 3.5x MLB.
imdesigner311 t1_j9apqjv wrote
Even the NBA fans are load managing
crunchydoritos1 t1_j9aq30c wrote
NASCAR beats them all..200,000 were at the Daytona 500
w3tsnail t1_j9c61ou wrote
You are comparing an annual event to sports that have 80-160 games per season, can't really make a comparison there.
majmatthew t1_j9dj1xn wrote
Edit: it's late, I am dumb.
Ill_Technician_5672 t1_j9dmrn2 wrote
bc in reality you're talking about 200+ nfl games v 36 races. In addition, you're talking about 8-9 home games v what, 2? 3? per nascar.
egusta t1_j9ay3ld wrote
Interesting. Bristol is 153,000. NASCAR would blow this chart out.
JBoy9028 t1_j9cmqgy wrote
Motorsports and College Football would blow the scales off this chart
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kywiking t1_j9ckfrj wrote
There are more football games than nascar games and some teams could add thousands of seats and still sell out.
SeriousPuppet t1_j9e8vef wrote
Some big 10 teams do well. Esp Ohio State and Michigan.
I_Wanna_Score t1_j9ax62u wrote
What is this chart called? Very nice and descriptive! How can I generate my own? Which tools do you use to produce it? Thanks!
BoMcCready OP t1_j9ayizw wrote
Thank you! This might be considered a beeswarm chart. I used Tableau to drive all the calculations. I made up my own formulas but I think this blog post from Ken Flerlage walks through it well too.
windowtothesoul t1_j9dls6v wrote
Good chart. Might try this in excel at a later point. Maybe try to make size or shade of circles into some measure too.
Artistic-Breadfruit9 t1_j9az0ow wrote
Normalize by stadium capacity for a truer picture.
LegendOfVinnyT t1_j9bdk62 wrote
I wonder how much the Arizona Coyotes playing in a 4,600-seat college arena while they wait for their own barn to be built skews the NHL.
CMFETCU t1_j9c7tat wrote
I wonder if you could add college sports that feed each league.
SEC football for example has Knoxville gathering 120k fans for a game on the regular.
Would be interesting to see those feeding leagues, and even more so it you graphed funds associated with those leagues on a vertical axis for each.
oren0 t1_j9dgebf wrote
>SEC football for example has Knoxville gathering 120k fans for a game on the regular.
Not sure where you're getting that number, but Neyland only seats 101k. The 3 highest capacity stadiums are actually all in the big 10. It is true that the largest crowd ever (156k) to see a college football game was in Tennessee, but that was a one-time event at the NASCAR track in Bristol.
CMFETCU t1_j9dim6w wrote
The fans do not all fit in the stadium. A game day at Neyland has thousands outside the stadium there for the game as traveling fans into Knoxville. The traffic is an nee after a game, and downtown is a mess to be avoided.
Anyone who travels by car for the game to the site of the game, whether they fit inside the stadium or not, is absolutely a fan. Since they pay for parking to do BBQs in the parking lot, are issued tickets for this, and are traceable; it seems relevant to call out their existence.
If you want to strictly define attendees inside that study ms that is fine, but it does paint a different picture than that on the ground of many events.
oren0 t1_j9doi4w wrote
Yeah I get it, but if you want to count tailgaters and people near the stadium for college football, you'd have to do the same thing for every other sport. Those numbers are uncountable.
Sig770 t1_j9apxlv wrote
Soccer has not attendance than the NBA? What am I missing here
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9ar5rp wrote
Outdoor stadiums have more seats.
KellyKellogs t1_j9cp8xa wrote
More seats in football stadiums.
Football is also a fairly popular sport in the USA and the fastest growing one and the most popular sport among young Americans.
There are also less MLS games a year than NBA games so fans can afford to attend a higher percentage of MLS games than NBA ones.
SkyrimWithdrawal t1_j9asvzu wrote
Now do Aussie Rules Football
redsterXVI t1_j9e903h wrote
MLS? Isn't that soccer? Soccer is bigger in NA than basketball and hockey? How come we (overseas) hear more about NBA and NHL than MLS?
Kailmo t1_j9bxnbc wrote
I'd go to an NFL game if I could afford the tickets.
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Beginning_Repeat9343 t1_j9ap6dg wrote
It would interesting to incorporate sellouts into this as I think that is more telling than attendance, but still cool
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Harpo426 t1_j9biigi wrote
This should be scaled for percentage of stadium size. NHL looks like it actually has a higher average in that way.
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pauliep308 t1_j9bdvqf wrote
Where is the WNBA numbers? Can the chart accommodate numbers in the hundreds?
SpiderFarter t1_j9bohqi wrote
Green Bay Packers have sold out every game for decades and has 20-30 year waiting list. 80,000 seats in a city of 105,000 too.
TheKrowDontFly t1_j9co2nz wrote
Amazing. Larger average capacity translates into more attendance averages.
gt_ap t1_j9d2v18 wrote
> Amazing. Larger average capacity translates into more attendance averages.
I’m guessing that stadium capacities scale to the attendance. Sellouts almost never happen in many stadiums.
Showenup t1_j9dei6g wrote
Now do average television viewership + social media video views
jonesjeffum t1_j9b73xj wrote
Yeah but times this by how many games they have
Goldberg_the_Goalie t1_j9c01jj wrote
How big are the stadiums though? Average attendance should be compared to average max capacity.
B4dA1r t1_j9c4cnq wrote
It's on the chart
Goldberg_the_Goalie t1_j9dpzbm wrote
Ah thank thank you. My observation is still that the gap between capacity and attendance is the biggest insight. So if the x axis was % attendance, you could compare the sports more easily.
dohboy420 t1_j9b3yvn wrote
Does the WNBA get their own chart?! Cuz that’s not very… equal!
BoMcCready OP t1_j9b49lf wrote
Yep, that's totally fair! I went with the five most-attended leagues here but the WNBA would be a good addition. The NWSL has solid attendance too.
cardibfree t1_j9beiht wrote
The NLL has very good attendance numbers also
Make_the_music_stop t1_j9ajfgz wrote
The gap between the two lines is telling. Down to price or popularity? Baseball has so many empty seats!