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More than that, the article says Lucchino himself plans on buying the Batavia Muckdogs, moving them to Pawtucket to appease us whiners, and moving the Red Sox Class A player development contract from Lowell to Pawtucket. Hopefully that means McCoy, and not a $75 million handout for a new Class A stadium.
I think if Pawtucket got the Single A Red Sox, this then means the Marlins Single A affiliation would be transferred to Lowell. A Single A team that plays just 38 home games in my view does not justify spending tens of millions in public money for a new stadium. Same with a NE Revolution stadium that would play just 17 home games. Just not enough dates of use for payback. Would have to use McCoy with minimal renovations. Also would not spend a lot on McCoy given Lucchino has no issue in moving teams around and could easily bolt again for the next high bidder. Would not trust him enough for a large public investment. If some minor league team owner that plays 38 or less games wants RI to do build a new stadium, just say no thanks.
It all however just seems so dirty with longtime teams and their fans being treated so poorly. Worcester really screwed over other New England cities in many ways. Their huge public welfare gift to the Pawsox owners has now raised the bar locally to impossible levels for most New England cities. The move to Worcester looks like it may also set off a ripple effect where the people of both Pawtucket and Lowell might get screwed.
I think if Pawtucket got the Single A Red Sox, this then means the Marlins Single A affiliation would be transferred to Lowell. A Single A team that plays just 38 home games in my view does not justify spending tens of millions in public money for a new stadium. Same with a NE Revolution stadium that would play just 17 home games. Just not enough dates of use for payback. Would have to use McCoy with minimal renovations. Also would not spend a lot on McCoy given Lucchino has no issue in moving teams around and could easily bolt again for the next high bidder. Would not trust him enough for a large public investment. If some minor league team owner that plays 38 or less games wants RI to do build a new stadium, just say no thanks.
It all however just seems so dirty with longtime teams and their fans being treated so poorly. Worcester really screwed over other New England cities in many ways. Their huge public welfare gift to the Pawsox owners has now raised the bar locally to impossible levels for most New England cities. The move to Worcester looks like it may also set off a ripple effect where the people of both Pawtucket and Lowell might get screwed.
The attendance for the Lowell Spinners has been consistently going down for over a decade. It's down nearly 40%. I'm actually surprised they draw mid 3's (down from mid 5's).
MMS, how do you think they'd do attendance wise in Pawtucket? Prior to looking up the attendance figures in Lowell, I would have guessed they'd be lucky to average 2k. Now I just don't know. Single A (even a Red Sox affiliate) doesn't have much appeal to me, but those numbers in Lowell are pretty impressive - even with the large decline. I wonder if the PawSox regulars would continue to go. I'm thinking they just might. But who knows...
The attendance for the Lowell Spinners has been consistently going down for over a decade. It's down nearly 40%. I'm actually surprised they draw mid 3's (down from mid 5's).
Yeah, last year Lowell averaged 3,516, which was slightly down from 2016 when they averaged 3,782.
Lowell is respectably 5th out of the 12 teams in the NY Penn League in average attendance.
The 2018 numbers should be out next week.
Heck in 2017, the Spinners averaged more people per game than the Gwinnett Braves (now the Stripers) did (3,135), who are a AAA team. Lowell also averaged more people per game than 9 AA teams, 25 High A teams and 18 Low A teams did in 2017.
I'm not saying this will be the case in Pawtucket, but when the Vancouver Canadians, a AAA team in the Pacific Coast League, left the city for a new ballpark in Sacramento in 2000, they were immediately replaced with a short season A team (also called the Vancouver Canadians) in the Northwest League and now average 6,303 people a game.
Which was like the 22nd best average in 2017 overall, out of the 160 MiLB teams, and Vancouver is probably one of the most beautiful places in North America, if not the world with plenty of things to do, especially from mid-June to the beginning of September.
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Originally Posted by mp775
More than that, the article says Lucchino himself plans on buying the Batavia Muckdogs, moving them to Pawtucket to appease us whiners, and moving the Red Sox Class A player development contract from Lowell to Pawtucket. Hopefully that means McCoy, and not a $75 million handout for a new Class A stadium.
Well, Mayor Grebien did say he's going to try to buy the Apex site regardless of the collapse of the PawSox deal...
I think Single A ball at McCoy could work, but Lucchino might just be poison here.
The problem going forward for the Lowell Spinners is not just the possible loss of the Red Sox affiliation. The Red Sox Triple AAA team in Worcester is going to draw fans away from them regardless of affiliation, especially from the 495 belt south of Lowell. Pawsox management have basically acknowledged that Worcester is not big enough to adequately support a team on its own and have indicated that they will very much try to make it a regional team drawing fans from further away than was the case in Pawtucket. If Lowell also loses its Red Sox connection, fan interest will drop off even more.
The Woosox are also going to kill the local Worcester Bravehearts college league team as well. There is no way they will be able to survive alongside the Woosox in Worcester.
The move to Worcester may set off a chain of events in New England minor league baseball hurting everyone else. Lowell, Pawtucket, Worcester Bravehearts, and even the Hartford Yardgoats (Springfield and NE CT area residents that might have gone to Hartford might now be more inclined to go to Worcester to see a Red Sox affiliate) could all be very much negatively affected.
Lowell fans should be concerned. I don't think the Red Sox organization can be really happy about having no minor league presence in New England's second largest metro area encompassing all of RI and SE Mass. I would not think having three team in the state of MA is good for regional New England branding. Lowell and its fans should be worried about Lucchino being involved in these rumors He could care less about others as he is all about chasing the money for himself.
Any Single A team in Pawtucket is never going to draw the numbers the Pawsox once did. A Marlins connection would be a tough draw. Only the people (many of them young families) that had been mainly going out to McCoy for years because it was a cheap entertainment night out would continue to go. A Red Sox affiliation would however entice more. My guess is a Red Sox team might be able to average 4-5,000 getting much bigger crowds for the Saturday promo nights. Keep in mind, the Single A short season (38 home games) only goes from about mid June to August mirroring the prime out of school summer months. No cold weather early season weeknight games to bring down the season average. Still would be a far cry from the Pawsox days of high averages and large total season attendance numbers with 70 game dates.
It's kind of a strangely written article. For instance, this quote seems completely off-base:
Quote:
Pawtucket Mayor Don Grebien has all but declared he believes negotiations with Lucchino to build a new ballpark in Pawtucket were conducted in bad faith, and his worst fears were realized when Lucchino announced the club would be moving to Worcester.
As far as I am concerned, Lucchino has worn out his welcome here, but I did not have the sense that Mayor Grebien put this negative spin on the negotiations with the team. He's basically said he thinks the House killed the deal, and that the PawSox would have stayed if the House had not intervened.
One thing from the article that was an interesting reminder was that the parent club owns a 10% stake in the AAA team. So the MLB franchise is also partially to blame for the PawSox leaving the state.
Yeah, last year Lowell averaged 3,516, which was slightly down from 2016 when they averaged 3,782.
Lowell is respectably 5th out of the 12 teams in the NY Penn League in average attendance.
The 2018 numbers should be out next week.
Heck in 2017, the Spinners averaged more people per game than the Gwinnett Braves (now the Stripers) did (3,135), who are a AAA team. Lowell also averaged more people per game than 9 AA teams, 25 High A teams and 18 Low A teams did in 2017.
I'm not saying this will be the case in Pawtucket, but when the Vancouver Canadians, a AAA team in the Pacific Coast League, left the city for a new ballpark in Sacramento in 2000, they were immediately replaced with a short season A team (also called the Vancouver Canadians) in the Northwest League and now average 6,303 people a game.
Which was like the 22nd best average in 2017 overall, out of the 160 MiLB teams, and Vancouver is probably one of the most beautiful places in North America, if not the world with plenty of things to do, especially from mid-June to the beginning of September.
2018 numbers are already out.
The Spinners were started in 1996 and drew very well for their first decade which follows the normal pattern for new minor league baseball teams and or stadiums (similar to Pawtucket's highest season attendance numbers in the first decade after the 1999 McCoy expansion/renovation). Lowell's attendance has however more recently been in a decline for several years. Edward A. LeLacheur Park, built in 1998 at a cost of 11.2M, now has a seating capacity of 4,797 with a SRO total capacity of 5,030. The team averaged 3,381 in 2018.
Keep in mind that the Single A short season has just 37 home games. The season runs in the warm weather months from mid June until in and around the end of August. This mirrors the out of school season for kids which is the peak baseball attendance time-frame. There are no cold weather April and May games on school nights to drag down attendance such as the case with Triple AAA (starts in early April and plays 70 home games).
Some of the decline at Lowell can likely be attributed to a bit less local passion and interest for the Boston Red Sox since their 2nd World Series win in 2007. It is worth noting that ticket availability increased, secondary market prices fell, and tv ratings for the Bosox fell off a bit after 2007 and I contend that this has translated over to its local farm teams in both Pawtucket and Lowell. Pawtucket however, unlike Lowell, also had the misfortune of being further hurt at the gate with a new ownership group who did not understand the local market and turned off many with new stadium demands.
As with the collegiate league Worcester Bravehearts, the move of the Pawsox to Worcester is likely to have negative effects on the Lowell Spinners. People that live along routes 495 and 2, south and west of Lowell, may substitute some of their visits to LeLacheur Park with a trip to Worcester in two years. A close by higher level Red Sox affiliate with a brand new ballpark will not help the Spinner attendance.
Another factor that may impact Red Sox minor league future attendance at all levels is Dombrowski's willingness to trade away top prospects for established major leaguers. And, at some point, this is going to backfire at the major league level.
I don't disagree that interest dropped after 2007, but overall interest really took a hit after 2011. The epic collapse, chicken & beer, Francona getting fired, etc. Did I mention Bobby Valentine?
I meant I was waiting for Ballpark Digest to do their annual tally of attendance numbers, totals, averages, by league, by class, overall, college, etc.
I'm too lazy to look the numbers up, plus they do I nice summarization every year!
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