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I guess as a anti-sports fan and as a chronic Ford basher... your not aware of The highly successful NFL business model

A lot of this is to do with risk. The business is perfectly hedged, which means one team’s losing season and poor revenues is offset by another team’s bumper year. Along with handsome revenues ($6.5bn annually), this financial certainty keeps NFL team values high as there is little chance of any going bankrupt.

– the idea of wealth redistribution in a staunchly capitalist country.

Hey...I would think thats right up your alley.:confused: But then again you dont like Ford, NFL, and Stadiums.

AG, relax with your annoying Ford rhetoric already. Its so tiring.

The business model for the NFL doesn't work in Canada as it does in the US - we are a different market and do not share the same broadcasting networks, not to mention advertisers - Canadian broadcasters do not have the money to pay the exorbitant rates that US broadcasters do, making for much less lucrative/attractive market for the NFL. I am not an expert, but this should sum it up fairly nicely:

The NFL has a revenue sharing program from its TV revenue, each team gets an equal share of the money paid out by the big networks who broadcast NFL games somewhere to the tune of $157 million for each team.
A team in Canada is a team in a foreign market and therefore does not have any benefit for the American Networks, not to mention that American networks do not measure Canadian TV ratings.
Any game broadcast simultaneously on Canadian networks shift their signals to Canadian content TV ads by regulation of the CRTC the board the regulates TV and radio communications in Canada.
It makes no sense for the American networks to pay a team that otherwise would not be able to watch ads broadcast from the companies that pay out big money during NFL games.
As well, Canadian networks can’t compete with American networks. During Superbowl, the most Canadian networks could charge to run a TV spot was $100,000.00 which is a far cry from the over $2 million that a tv spot would cost on the American networks.

Read more: http://sportales.com/football/reaso...eague-will-not-work-in-toronto/#ixzz1PebiA7Pw
 
On a semi-related note.... it's always nice to see the support the Jays get from the rest of Canada in other ballparks. The Jays are paying a rare visit to Cincinnati this weekend and there were an amazing amount of Jays fans in the crowd last night, even though it's not particularly close to any Canadian city.
 
Struggling to get 10,000? There are only a handful of times in their 34 year history they have gotten under 10,000.
10,000 was in reference to seasons tickets, which are about 1/3 the seasons tickets they had in the early 90s (when they were capped at 26,000), so my argument was/is that I find it hard to believe a playoff sellout in, say, October 2011 or '12 would be a metaphysical certainty.

But ignoring all that common sense - how about the fact that EVERY SINGLE playoff game in Blue Jays history has been a sellout? And this wasn't just about the skydome being new - the Jays were selling out games well before then? Why? Believe it or not.. because they were doing well
Hmm...

1985 playoffs:

Gm 1 - 39,115
Gm 2 - 34,029
Gm 6 - 37,557
Gm 7 - 32,084

Would have been hard for all these games to have been sellouts unless there was massive construction going on, besides which I'm pretty sure the baseball capacity at Exhibition Stadium was around 44K
 
Interesting.

Every playoff game from that series on (1989 ALCS, 1991 ALCS, 1992 ALCS, 1992 WS, 1993 ALCS and 1993 WS) WAS a sellout though. (a total of 18 games).

So I'd say gei's general point of 'based on attendance of past Jays playoff games, future ones are very likely to be sellouts' still stands.
 
If the Jays make it into the playoffs again, or are even in the race late in the season, you will see attendance pass 35,000 and 45,000 for actual playoff games.
 
If the Jays are contending in September, I think you'll easily see crowds of 35K or 40K down the stretch (I mean, they drew 30k on Wednesday afternoon in a meaningless game against the Orioles.).

I'm trying to be diplomatic with GenerationW, but if the Jays make the playoffs there is no doubt that the games would be sold out. The home openers sell out every year. That Halladay/Burnett game two years ago drew about 42k. Summertime Yankee/Red Sox matchups often draw in excess of 35K. A playoff game is far, far bigger than any of those events.

It's not really worth arguing about, to be frank.
 
Interesting.

Every playoff game from that series on (1989 ALCS, 1991 ALCS, 1992 ALCS, 1992 WS, 1993 ALCS and 1993 WS) WAS a sellout though. (a total of 18 games).

So I'd say gei's general point of 'based on attendance of past Jays playoff games, future ones are very likely to be sellouts' still stands.
Yeah, but all the regular season Dome games from 89-93 were also sellouts, or close to it. Unless regular season attendance was similar in a theoretical playoff season, then his point is pure speculation. The "wow" factor that came with the Dome being new is long gone, and nowadays some people don't even like the place.

If the Jays make it into the playoffs again, or are even in the race late in the season, you will see attendance pass 35,000 and 45,000 for actual playoff games.
That seems more reasonable.
 
If the Jays are contending in September, I think you'll easily see crowds of 35K or 40K down the stretch (I mean, they drew 30k on Wednesday afternoon in a meaningless game against the Orioles.).

Working near the Dome as I do, it was incredible how many buses of kids (I guess late year school trips) came into the city for that game. I have long believed that the Jays (perhaps all of major league baseball?) make a mistake by scheduling so few day games. I guess they work on the "attendance is higher if we schedule the games when people are not working" theory.

I think if they picked a day of the week (tuesday?) where every home game in July and August on that day was gonna be day game they would get increased attendance (and significantly increased at that). Those day games would draw crowds from 3 distinct groups:

1. Tourists........people visiting the city from cities/towns/countries who do not have major league baseball would buy tickets as "one of the things to do during the day on a visit to Toronto".....these people could also (and likely do) buy tickets to night games but they are the sort of people who would not notice a negative difference to moving the games to day time (they might actually prefer it);

2. Parents/People on Vacation.....there are a lot of people who take vacation time from work and do not actually go anywhere....parents struggling every day of that two week stint at home to fill days with the kids.......take 'em to a ball game in the middle of the day would be a reasonably affordable/fun day out.

3. Business folks entertaining clients.......we see no problem doing business entertainment for 5 or 6 hours on the golf course....why not a long/lazy lunch with a ball game in the background.

I think Toronto is very well situated (as a business city with a tourist component) to take advantage and bringing in those young fans for those games can build a future fan base as well.

Not sure why they limit the day games as they do!
 
I will fully agree with you on that.

How about day games on Fridays in June/July/August? You could even start late afternoon - like 3:00, so people could play hookey and leave work early.
 
Yeah, but all the regular season Dome games from 89-93 were also sellouts, or close to it. Unless regular season attendance was similar in a theoretical playoff season, then his point is pure speculation. The "wow" factor that came with the Dome being new is long gone, and nowadays some people don't even like the place.

That seems more reasonable.

In this year's opening weekend, the Jays drew crowds of 48,000 (was a sellout but they don't count comps), 27,000 and 35,000. In a three game series against Boston a couple weeks ago, the Jays drew crowds of 29K, 30K and 39K.

You think that a playoff series would draw crowds that are approximately the same as an opening weekend against the Twins in a non contending year? Or draw just a bit more than a midseason series against the Yankees or Red Sox would (in a season when the Jays are offering no real competition to them)?

If you follow the game even on a casual basis, it should be easy to see how drastically different a playoff series would be from series like those. Drastically different.
 
I will fully agree with you on that.

How about day games on Fridays in June/July/August? You could even start late afternoon - like 3:00, so people could play hookey and leave work early.

I doubt that they would do it for Friday games....those are already not a bad drawing crowd.......to me it makes more sense to do it on a Tuesday or a Wednesday and have them be true day games with a 12:35 or 1:05 first pitch.

But that is just me!
 
In this year's opening weekend, the Jays drew crowds of 48,000 (was a sellout but they don't count comps), 27,000 and 35,000. In a three game series against Boston a couple weeks ago, the Jays drew crowds of 29K, 30K and 39K.
Okay, but the next three games after the opening weekend drew just over 40K in total.

And Red Sox fans were how much of the crowd at those Boston games -- a quarter? A third?? A half??? Certainly looked like it could have been that many based on the number of people wearing Red Sox paraphernalia I saw crossing the street as I was driving on the Lakeshore right after the third game.

You think that a playoff series would draw crowds that are approximately the same as an opening weekend against the Twins in a non contending year? Or draw just a bit more than a midseason series against the Yankees or Red Sox would (in a season when the Jays are offering no real competition to them)?
Could be, but I still believe it's presumptuous to assume they'd be guaranteed sellouts.
 

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