Mitchell Report not affecting baseball ticket sales
December 26, 2007
Major League Baseball has always had its doomsayers. Well, maybe not always, but certainly in the past several decades. For one reason or another, baseball has been a dying sport. Except it has never died. And it's not about to die now because of the Mitchell Report.
The report, baseball's critics said instantly, deals a severe blow to the game's integrity, and fans will write off the game because players cheated on a wholesale scale.
Even Commissioner Bud Selig, in the past few years, has raised the integrity issue. He overruled his aides and ordered the investigation to protect baseball's integrity.
If fans question the game's integrity, they do it in a curious way. They keep going to games in record numbers and, based on offseason developments, they are prepared to do it again next season.
According to MLB figures, every team currently shows an increase in ticket sales compared with the corresponding time the previous offseason.
That's pretty remarkable considering that the final 2007 season attendance — 79.5 million — was a major league record. Season attendance was 76 million in 2006, 74.7 million in 2005, 73 million in 2004 and 67.6 million in 2003, the last year the attendance did not set a record.
Selig said he expects next season's attendance to eclipse 80 million for the first time, just as MLB revenue broke $6 billion this year.
So fans continue to buy tickets. They are, in effect, voting with their credit cards in support of the game.
What fans will do is question the integrity of individual players who are identified as having cheated. Fans outside of San Francisco last season clearly demonstrated their view of Barry Bonds' integrity, although they will nevertheless brag to their friends that they saw Bonds hit his 755th home run or his 762nd.
If Roger Clemens were to play next season, which he does not seem prepared to do, fans would let him know what they thought of his integrity, no matter how vehemently he denies allegations that he used illegal drugs to prolong his career.
Clemens, incidentally, may join Mark McGwire in the category of receiving really bad advice.
In 2005, for his appearance at a congressional hearing, McGwire, apparently facing a dilemma of truth and consequence, was advised not to answer questions about steroids.
Instead of answering, Yes, I did, and facing public scorn and professional humiliation, or No, I didn't, and facing possible charges of contempt of Congress for lying under oath, McGwire was advised to say "I'm not here to talk about the past" whenever asked about steroids.
Anyone who heard McGwire utter that refrain instantly stamped him as a user of illegal substances who was trying to avoid admitting it. Fans and reporters wrote him off.
Clemens has staged a double-barreled attack in defense of his reputation. This past week he issued a statement denying that he ever used illegal substances, as his former trainer told the Mitchell investigation. This week he repeated his denial on a video broadcast over the Internet.
Assuming he issued those denials on the advice of his lawyers or agents, or both, he, like McGwire, might have received bad advice. Two congressional hearings are scheduled for next month. Neither committee has called any players as witnesses. But Clemens, with his stern denials, might have caught their attention.
Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., who is chairman of a House oversight committee, might be intrigued enough by the different versions of Clemens and steroids to subpoena him and his former trainer, Brian McNamee, as witnesses: Did Clemens or didn't Clemens use steroids? And, an even bigger issue, how reliable is the Mitchell Report?
Had Clemens waited to issue his denial, he would probably have avoided raising congressional curiosity. Now he might have stirred it.
News source：http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/baseball/marlins/sfl-flspmitchellrep26sbdec26,0,6082580.story
Major League Baseball has always had its doomsayers. Well, maybe not always, but certainly in the past several decades. For one reason or another, baseball has been a dying sport. Except it has never died. And it's not about to die now because of the Mitchell Report.
The report, baseball's critics said instantly, deals a severe blow to the game's integrity, and fans will write off the game because players cheated on a wholesale scale.
Even Commissioner Bud Selig, in the past few years, has raised the integrity issue. He overruled his aides and ordered the investigation to protect baseball's integrity.
If fans question the game's integrity, they do it in a curious way. They keep going to games in record numbers and, based on offseason developments, they are prepared to do it again next season.
According to MLB figures, every team currently shows an increase in ticket sales compared with the corresponding time the previous offseason.
That's pretty remarkable considering that the final 2007 season attendance — 79.5 million — was a major league record. Season attendance was 76 million in 2006, 74.7 million in 2005, 73 million in 2004 and 67.6 million in 2003, the last year the attendance did not set a record.
Selig said he expects next season's attendance to eclipse 80 million for the first time, just as MLB revenue broke $6 billion this year.
So fans continue to buy tickets. They are, in effect, voting with their credit cards in support of the game.
What fans will do is question the integrity of individual players who are identified as having cheated. Fans outside of San Francisco last season clearly demonstrated their view of Barry Bonds' integrity, although they will nevertheless brag to their friends that they saw Bonds hit his 755th home run or his 762nd.
If Roger Clemens were to play next season, which he does not seem prepared to do, fans would let him know what they thought of his integrity, no matter how vehemently he denies allegations that he used illegal drugs to prolong his career.
Clemens, incidentally, may join Mark McGwire in the category of receiving really bad advice.
In 2005, for his appearance at a congressional hearing, McGwire, apparently facing a dilemma of truth and consequence, was advised not to answer questions about steroids.
Instead of answering, Yes, I did, and facing public scorn and professional humiliation, or No, I didn't, and facing possible charges of contempt of Congress for lying under oath, McGwire was advised to say "I'm not here to talk about the past" whenever asked about steroids.
Anyone who heard McGwire utter that refrain instantly stamped him as a user of illegal substances who was trying to avoid admitting it. Fans and reporters wrote him off.
Clemens has staged a double-barreled attack in defense of his reputation. This past week he issued a statement denying that he ever used illegal substances, as his former trainer told the Mitchell investigation. This week he repeated his denial on a video broadcast over the Internet.
Assuming he issued those denials on the advice of his lawyers or agents, or both, he, like McGwire, might have received bad advice. Two congressional hearings are scheduled for next month. Neither committee has called any players as witnesses. But Clemens, with his stern denials, might have caught their attention.
Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., who is chairman of a House oversight committee, might be intrigued enough by the different versions of Clemens and steroids to subpoena him and his former trainer, Brian McNamee, as witnesses: Did Clemens or didn't Clemens use steroids? And, an even bigger issue, how reliable is the Mitchell Report?
Had Clemens waited to issue his denial, he would probably have avoided raising congressional curiosity. Now he might have stirred it.
News source：http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/baseball/marlins/sfl-flspmitchellrep26sbdec26,0,6082580.story
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