Tiger Geist

(NOTE:  Written pre-trade as I was still out of the country when I wrote but didn’t post this)

Billfer is doing an excellent job covering the Winter meetings, as well as covering the mystique in a Tiger firesale this winter.  A few other national writers have chimed in as well, but (granted, reading this from afar.. as in India and Great Britain this month), I’m still confused.

As deepthroat said in “All the President’s Men”… Follow the money.

I get the revenue sharing, the attendance figures, etc.  I get that Detroit is getting a ton of cash from their very lucrative TV deal.  What I don’t understand is this very question:

If a team can make so much money, why would they ever bother to build a new stadium?

The answer is, of course, that stadiums provide an incredible amount of income.  And that is where I’m having a disconnect at the moment.  If the Tigers can’t get sponsorship deals or sell suites, then they’re losing a ton of expected income (based on the reason they built the stadium in the first place).  We simply cannot discount this; this is where the local economy has a direct impact on the team.  Also, the attendance figures don’t necessarily mean anything; what the team needs when they lay out the season expenses is the season ticket numbers (pre-sale) and the suite numbers.  They don’t want to predict the team’s expenses based on what they think the attendance figures might be.  A cold April or a third place team in August can kill any prediction;  what they need is people who pay up front.

Why would Oakland care to get a new stadium if they can get tons of money before selling a seat?  Why would St Louis build a new stadium when they have one of the best fan bases in the country, and averaged about 3million in attendance for the 10 years leading up to their new stadium?  Things are not as dire at the Tigers headquarters, but it is not all roses.  The local economy has a giant affect on the team’s income, and much of that relates to the stadium.  And in essence, most of this additional stadium money is not from fans, its from corporations.

While it doesn’t signal a firesale, the reason behind not significantly cutting payroll can’t simply be discounted as “revenue sharing and local TV money”.  If it was that simple, everyone would still share football and baseball stadiums.  The sponsorship and private suite dollars are huge.  Maybe the team can survive without the stadium income.  But that’s where the ‘free agent’ money comes from.

We’re missing something here.  And of course, its all smoke and mirrors.  NO ONE KNOWS.  That’s the problem with most major sports, but with baseball its the biggest:  No one talks, no one opens their books.  We can’t assume that anything we’re told from the league is true… because, you know, they’ve been pretty truthful about everything in the past.  And the amount of money coming in from stadiums can be staggering;  this is one of the main labor issues in the upcoming NFL CBA — Dallas and Buffalo have different revenue streams in terms of stadium numbers.  These types of revenues are not shared, and almost exclusively never discussed in public.

On the flip side of this, if estimates that Detroit is losing money but its manageable (personally, I think they’re going to lose a ton in 2010), then its quite possible they made a giant windfall leading up to 2008/2009 with the opening of Comerica Park.  So I’m not exactly shedding any tears for the team.