The reason for the huge difference is the fact that in the mid 90s we got a really good young baseball team assembled just as Art Modell stole our football team. All the attention of the Browns was directed at the Indians, and with a brand new stadium. Those numbers were seriously elevated and likely will never be matched.
As a lifelong yankee fan who grew up in manhattan, i always thought that the chief wahoo logo was one of the coolest logos in not just the MLB but in pro sports as a whole.
I remember growing up during the sellout streak. My dad had season tickets at Jacobs Field throughout the 90s. That was the most fun I ever had watching baseball. The ballpark has regressed significantly since the streak ended.
Two reasons: 1. Heart broken almost winning it all jaded the fans 2. The dumb name change caving to the far left minority when the fans did not want it.
Number one is no excuse for fans to ditch their team. Number two is completely legitimate and the only reason I don't support this organization anymore.
Number one is stupid. I'm not even an Indians fan, but I remember that late 90s team more than a lot of years of my favorite team (Cardinals). Those were some of the most talented teams I've ever seen.
Changing the name and signing a contract with Bally Sports were two of the dumbest decisions ever. I grew up watching the Indians on our local channels pretending to be the players I could name in their batting order.
The most interesting thing is that Bally Sports Great Lakes was once Sports Time Ohio which was owned by the Cleveland Indians. Sports Time Ohio was then sold to Fox then Sinclair which formed a subsidiary company called Diamond Sports which owns Bally Sports. The now Cleveland Guardians should have kept Sports Time Ohio.
Changing the name and logo was the worst thing this organization could've done. The Indians and Chief Wahoo were literally iconic across America. For a penny pinching owner, that's a real head-scratcher. I hope he regrets it every day of his life!
@@marcjsolis I’m talking before that. In the 90s it was on basic cable, same channel as the local news. Channel 8 where I grew up. No sports time this bally sports that. Local fkn free channel
Totally agree with you, that change of its name lost their identity. I hope that revert sometime in the future, the Braves and Blackhawks don’t change their names they fought. Come on some say Indians are disgraceful for the native americans like Redskin, I only see two franchises who lose their connection with communities.
I grew up a Jim Thome fan in the mid-late 90s from New York. I so fondly recall these days. The stadium was wild every night. Loved the dark infield dirt seasons at the Jake.
Two problems caused this: - Changing the stadium name from Jacobs Field to Progressive Corporation (headquartered in the Cleveland suburb of Mayfield Village, Ohio) Field - Changing the team name from the Indians to the Guardians 🤦♂️
the attendance was terrible for YEARS, since the mid 2000s. the name change has nothing to do with it. just look at the espn attedance figures. they've been towards the bottom in attendance for almost 20 years
The falloff in attendance has far more to do with a consistently poor product on the field, Indians or Guardians doesn’t matter much. If the ownership would spend the money to build up the team into a contender the fans will come back, the 455 streak proved it.
@@stevenundisclosed6091Your grammar is off but if you think changing the name and logo didn't further destroy support for this team you're nuts. No one wants to support this woke team with no identity.
Couple of thoughts from a season ticket holder... - You have to remember the sell out streak was for a superior on field product, yes, but also coincided with the years the Browns were gone and some of the worst Cavs teams to date. What else was there to do? - Yes the shipping containers were ugly - The downtown and the surrounding areas (Ohio City, Tremont, Gordon Square, etc.) are experiencing a revival of population that hasn't been seen in Cleveland since the mid 20th century. No one (figure of speech) actually lived downtown in the 90's, so I wouldn't really go as far as saying that the overall city population declining had much to do with the attendance problem. - A lot of these people moving (back) downtown are younger people who grew up in the suburbs as Cleveland sports fans. This younger population may lack the interest in baseball that the fans of the 90's had, but enjoys a cheap dog and a beer as much as the next guy. The new renovations are aimed at getting this casual fan into the ball park as much as possible with food/drink deals and monthly standing room only passes (hence expanded standing room only areas). - Getting as close as you can to the bullpens as the stadium allows is actually pretty cool and creates an intimacy and ability to interact with the players you don't get many other places. Watching Clase warm up for a save at eye level, only 10 feet away, is something any baseball fan could appreciate. - People are just generally upset with what the Dolans have done with the team and have lost interest. Whether it's right or wrong, we Clevelanders are a stubborn species.
As a White Sox fan it still bothers me that the Indians didn't win in 2016. Not because I dislike the Cubs but because Cleveland had the better team. Injuries really hampered them in the WS. Not having their best hitter and 2 starting pitchers. And I have no idea how the legendary 90s team never won 🤷🏻
Other than Jose Ramirez, what other players on the Indians or Guardians has the team actually invested in? It became a bargain team and people stopped coming to see games.
You need to look at how tickets were sold during the 455 game run. I remember being out in the street looking for a ticket and dealt with scalpers holding stacks of brand new 7:08 tickets for the upper decks that were 3 inches thick. Somehow large amounts of tickets were distributed to ticket brokers at a deep discount and then accounted for as sold in order to chase that record. Once the team went down then that practice wasn’t worth the effort nor were the fans interested in sitting in the nose bleeds to watch a poo team.
The first home games after this video was posted, Cleveland had their first sellout. Then, the next home weekend against the Nats, two more sellouts! It’s like the Gods felt your love and brought the fans back!
The worst stadium tho? Cmon man. Obviously it isn’t the sell out Jacobs field. But to call it the worst is pretty wild. Still a beautiful ballpark with a great team. The owners just don’t spend money. Still gorgeous tho in person when you’re there
You might not like how the renovations in the upper deck look but to say it isn’t an improvement is silly. It gives fans that buy tickets in those sections food beverage and dans shop options which make upper deck tickets, which are more affordable, more enticing. It makes the experience better for fans and the hope is they sell more tickets bc of that
Same thing happened to the Blue Jays. Crazy attendance for the first few years after the Dome opened... you couldn't get a ticket. The dome was brand new... a technological marvel... we were "world class" after years of suffering in Exhibition Stadium. Then after 1994 attendance fell off a cliff... poorer record after the World Series wins... the 1994 strike... and the opening of Camden Yards that made the dome suddenly feel outdated.
Taking out the seats and renovating it cost money. Empty seats waiting for an exciting on field product doesn’t cost anything. Should have left a good design alone. Baseball shouldn’t be about a “circus environment”. It should be about a great team and good marketing. Jacob’s Field was great the way it was.
Here's what these teams can do to bring fans in. A. Make is affordable for a family of 4 to go to the ballpark. 1. Tickets $80 a piece minimum for bad seats. 2. Parking $50 3. Food $100 At the end of the day your dropping at least $500 for 1 game.
- you can get tickets under $50 even with weekend games fairly often on the resale market - $50 parking is definitely not the case in cleveland. unless you want really good parking. more like $15-20. - stadium food is usually overpriced. you can do it for a family of four in Cleveland and many other markets for like $300, less with some promotions.
@UserName-ts3sp I live in Mass and you definatley can't do that at Fenway, but yeah in other cities you can for sure, but right now even at $300 total for a game, how many times a month are you going to drop $300 to go to a game? Most families will go once or twice a year.
Boy do i really miss that 90's era. I was in my early 20's and would hang out downtown in the flats. ( A group of bars). A lot of the Indians players would go down there and hang out with everyone. And going to the games was just so insane. Never experienced anything like it before or ever since. Was truly an amazing time in my life. So sad to see the stadium vacant, especially since the Indians/Guardians are doing well. I feel bad for the players, they deserve better.
Man being an Indians fan my whole life it’s been hard to watch the decline with poor ownership a horrible name change and an unwillingness to spend money not just on free agents but to keep talent has been a 20yr kick in the dick. Hopefully when the Dolans sell to the minority owner in a few years that changes things. I still get pissed when I think about Paul Dolan telling reporters they would spend money when people come and support the team. That was such an opposite backwards way of running a baseball team. They are douches.
You shouldn't support this woke organization at all until they bring back the rightful name and logo. Dolan is exactly what you called him so stop giving him your money.
They have like a monument park in centerfield that I think they did a great job on. This stadium very much still holds up in todays mlb. It’s one of my favorites honestly
New name, cheap ownership, cheap team payroll, and subpar season after season.... Pretty sure those are reasons for attendance shitting the bed before the stadium issues come to mind. People are moving back into downtown with all of the construction of high rise residential buildings. Take a look at the Pirates. Top rated stadium... Shit owner, shit team, both equal horrid attendance.
3.50ish gas - I live in Hudson/Stow area. To go the game and pay for parking - parking is like 10-20 bucks, gas is 10 bucks. I can't take the bus or train from here either. In 1995 it was like 1 dollar for gas and parking was 5-10 bucks. But I always went to 1-2 games a year, and continue to go to 1-2 games a year. My attendance hasn't dipped. I'll also say that Cleveland weather is better in the summer which impacts attendance.
I went to many Indians games in the mid to late 90’s. After the 2001 season, it was like the magic left and never really returned. There were some good years along the way to be sure, but that fevered feeling we had for our Indians from 1994-2001 never returned.
And its so disheartening because the team has far and away been the most consistent team of the 3 in cleveland over the last 30 years. I mean they have the 4th highest win percentage in baseball over the last decade. But it's like the city just does not care one bit about them. You have a 100 win team in 2017 than only pulls an average of 58% capacity. that's just not acceptable
Because the tickets are too expensive, back in the day they weren’t anymore than five dollars if they make the tickets cheap people may sellout the ball park again 😮
Jacobs field was the envy of the league when it first opened. I believe players ranked it as the best stadum in baseball as late as 2008. You couldnt buy a ticket in cleveland for years. Had to be on a waiting list. Still looks good to me after 30 years.
Just like the movie major league ,stick up advertising bill boards to cover empty seats who was the Einstein idiot that decided this 🤯 The organization took a beautiful stadium and turned it into a dumpster fire 😮😢
Must not be watching the team this year.. Last Saturday was sold out for the first May sell out since 2011.. Seems to me they are doing a lot better on attendance than most think.. Can't blame pricing either with 49$ monthly pass to all home games.
Perfect example of how to turn off a fan base. Issue continues to be competitive balance. When you have teams like the Yankees and Dodgers spending three times as much and landing all the players people want to see, people lose interest. In the 80s and 90s even early 2020s it was still somewhat plausible for teams like Indians to compete, now it just is not unless they get a really fluke year. They have also had bad management which does not help.
As someone who’s been to progressive field a dozen+ times there are always a ton of people surrounding the bullpen throughout the game watching the pitchers including myself. It’s nice because you can watch them warm up and still watch the game
To sum it all up: the browns moved for 5 years and then they came back. End of story. Cleveland isn’t a big enough town to support 3 professional teams. The fans are supporting the browns as north east Ohio is a football area (football hall of fame is located here)
The biggest issue is the ownership, they wanted to make money and were unwilling to pay to put a consistent winner on the field, then the name change did not help matters either
we used to drive down from Toronto when the Blue Jays were in town - I remember enthusiastic fans and lots of full seats. Shame it has apparently changed.
Crazy what happens when you insult your fans calling them racists for liking a teams name, and then putting a bad product on the field because ownership is cheap. Poor botched stadium renovations, and an overall disappointing team since they lost the WS in 2016 has led to this. Their success so far this year is pretty much blind luck.
What is this bad product everyone in the comments is speaking of? Cleveland has been enormously successful the last 11 years. They just haven’t won a World Series
@@PittsburghMarky I thought they should’ve renamed to the Tribe with a new logo. The guardians name was terrible. Nevertheless cleveland has the 4th highest winning pct in baseball since 2013. The product has been fine the fans don’t show because cleveland is too small to support mlb nba and nfl. Take the browns away again and the guardians would add 5,000 - 10,000 more fans a game
@@gnielsen07 Disagree.My goodness, they're trying to put three teams in Las Vegas an dits only the 38th largest market whereas Cleveland is in the Top 20. It's the name change AND the logo change. Period.
Absolutely perfect timing. That is what resulted in the Indians' 455 game sellout streak. 1.) Browns left town. The Indians filled some of the attendance void they left behind. 2.) Brand new (at the time) state of the art stadium. 3.) A team with historically significant offense just reaching its potential. It was quite literally a perfect storm, in a good way, for the Indians. It's not a bad baseball town, but it's not on par with a similar sized market like St. Louis.
And it really sucks because that franchise has been far and away the best run and most consistent of the 3 cleveland teams for almost 30 years, yet the town just has never dove all in on them. They'll pack the completely irrelevant browns for 20 years, but then our one consistent team gets nothing. The 100 win 2017 team gets an average of 58% capacity. The 2017 browns went winless and still got 87% capacity average
I've sat in many locations in this stadium over several games over the years. I once sat late game, first row of that third deck in right field, just to check the vantage point. It was a flat out, terrible seat...far too removed from the action. A third renovation should just remove that third deck in right field entirely.
I'm gonna add to what I'm pretty sure are many comments pointing out the obvious.. Things are not gonna get any better after they took down chief wahoo and then eventually the name IT DOES MATTER. It is a big deal and there's no conversation to be had about it. The Cleveland Indians were a storied franchise and made up the face of mlb having an entire movie series showcase their Franchise brand. This team should relocate somewhere else If the current fans of Cleveland did not do enough to step up and protest the BS.
There was an ownership change. There was a massive shift in the economy of NE Ohio, and the Browns came back. Couple that with the Indians being a bad team for several years and that explains the attendance drop.
The sellout streak was a confluence of a perfect storm of events. The Browns moved away, the team got good for the first time in 40 years, a brand new stadium that was arguably the best in baseball when it opened, Cavs weren’t good, etc. Outside of the 40-50s and mid 90s-early 00’s, Cleveland has never had good attendance. It’s not a baseball town. I think the latest round of renovations will be a good upgrade.
They are actually seeing an increase in downtown population that will continue over the next decade with all the buildings being converted to apartmens....a major issue is the consistent downtown workforce is dropping with more people able to work from home.
i think the new renovations are a great idea and dont look that bad. Better to have a bar area that might provide a better social environment and a reason to be there than a bunch of empty seats. those seats were useless aside from opening day and playoff games.
People talk about baseball’s financial system being the cause when that is not really true. If we look back Cleveland’s attendance began to crater shortly after the highs of 1954, the Indians were a terrible draw after Trader Lane gave up their star attraction. Than you had the Browns take over as Cleveland’s main sports attraction while the Indians went into the cellar, combine that with Cleveland’s population decline after that you have the ingredients for Cleveland’s initial attendance woes. Now when did the Indians see an attendance rebound? When the Browns left, the sellout streak began the year the Browns left and ended in 2001 when people thought the Browns were in the rebound. Cleveland is a market which will favor a good Browns team over middling Indians teams and that was shown, combine that with population decline etc, that’s what caused it. I’ll argue that the lack of inclusion in MLB’s postseason system between 1969 and really 2021 is one of the main reasons small markets failed and loss ground to other sports, every other league had postseasons in which more than only 4 teams had the opportunity to make the postseason, you’re going to take losses in the markets you share with the NBA, NFL and NHL, but MLB maintained that rigid structure for decades and took the losses, after 1981 a Wild Cars should’ve been instituted, that would have saved interest in cities, by at least adding more postseason teams. Fans are quick to blame high spending owners who are doing what they should to maintain a team when that’s not the cause of disinterested fans, it’s decades of frankly meaningless seasons caused by a rigid postseason system, terrible owners, over-embracing the RSN model etc.
The focus is all on drinking and standing around talking or phones instead of watching a game as the main event. Oh and the Cleveland restaurants inside the stadium that cost more than the same business would in its original location.
a lot of people in the comments are pointing the finger on numerous different things regarding the low atttendance. the botttomline is this, the sellout streak was literally the perfect storm. Browns had skipped town leaving a rabid city desperate for some kind of positive sports story to rally around. The team had superstars and championship caliber talent contending every year. Most importantly, they had a brand new stadium that was state of the art and the place to be. there are statistical studies proving that there is a "honeymoon phase" of attendance boosts whenever a new stadium is built for any team not just cleveland or MLB. This is what led to the sellout streak, and once the talent went away, rebuilding started, the new stadiums shine started to wear off, the browns came back, the cavs got lebron, all of this led to attendance dropping back down. I say "back" down because before jacobs field, our attendance was terrible for decades and decades at municipal. high attendance was never the norm in cleveland and everyone forgot that. furthermore, add on the fact that baseball in general has had attendance issues, and is desperate to turn that around with pitch clocks and what not, the new generation of americans just arent into baseball or sports as the old ones. heck they are more interested in watching someone play madden than to watch an actual nfl game seems like.
I feel like we gotta out into consideration at least for this year that the nba team right across the street that is literally in the playoffs takes most of the fans and also this isn’t the prime weather for Cleveland
What many people forget is the majority of those 455 sellouts came when there was no football team in town. Then by 2004 LeBron was in town. Cleveland is the poorest city in the US, there just isn’t enough money to consistently go to everything.
Attendance issue has little to do with the success of the team. They’re almost always competitive and the attendance didn’t change dramatically when they were playing the World Series or the year after that. The attendance sharply declined after 2001. What happened at that time? Well in the 90s the city was considered a “comeback” city. But prior to 2000 it was slowing down and people were moving out to the Suburbs. While the metro area is still one of the largest in the country the city itself was declining enough that they lost the qualification for a lot of federal economic support. In 2001 there was a big shift in Cleveland politics when the mayor left office to farm alpacas… and a large portion of Cleveland’s politicians that hold offices today began their careers around that time… Basically the issue is that the city declined in population and the city officials have done a poor job at enticing business/corporations/jobs to move to the city and ultimately the city has just continued to age. People don’t look at Cleveland as a place of opportunity so no one’s moving here and bc no one lives there and the people that do live there don’t have a lot of career opportunities the sports franchises, which are one of the cities biggest economic drivers, so they aren’t attended games they can’t afford that have also become more accessible to viewers from home since 2000…
@@Marketex1 wrong. Cleveland has been mostly 1st (but a few times second) for almost 20 years in percentage of residents living in poverty, averaging around 31%. The only thing not even close is your comment.
problem is you dont' need many seats anymore. 10K-20K seems good.. nothing more. plus with how cost has gone up not everyone can afford to even go to games anymore. i rather go to a minor league AAA to partner leagues. its cheeper and get some nice games.
As much as I agree they should’ve kept the Indians name I still can’t understand why they chose the Guardians over the Spiders. The Cleveland Spiders would’ve had some cool options for uniforms and logos
To me, the biggest factor in the sellout streak was the absence of the Browns. Cleveland has always been a football-first city regardless of how the team was performing which is disappointing. The Indians/Guardians have put far more competitive teams on the field than the Browns during the last 25 years and yet, the Browns always get the support no matter what.
it's really irritating honestly. Doesn't matter how bad that team was for 20 years, everyone came to them no matter what. But the baseball team spends the last 25 years completely unable to drawn even 60%
I’m also completely baffled by the fans, when it comes to this fact…it’s been consistently a terrible product for TWENTY FIVE YEARS, and the fans continue to show up and pay ridiculous prices for the garbage result week after week-and then COMPLAIN about it 😂😂😂
@@GP9167 yeah like the baseball team has had a couple dips here and there, but by and large since the mid 90s has been pretty successful. The browns on the other hand haven't done ANYTHING. Yet they're the team people flock to
The reason for the huge difference is the fact that in the mid 90s we got a really good young baseball team assembled just as Art Modell stole our football team. All the attention of the Browns was directed at the Indians, and with a brand new stadium. Those numbers were seriously elevated and likely will never be matched.
Exactly right. Perfect storm for the baseball team. New stadium. Great, fun team. No football.
Using the scary music with this is hilarious
Waaaaaahhhoooooooooooo-oooooooooooooo
As a lifelong yankee fan who grew up in manhattan, i always thought that the chief wahoo logo was one of the coolest logos in not just the MLB but in pro sports as a whole.
It is.
I remember growing up during the sellout streak. My dad had season tickets at Jacobs Field throughout the 90s. That was the most fun I ever had watching baseball. The ballpark has regressed significantly since the streak ended.
Changing the team's name didn't help. A lot of people quit.
Count me in
I’m against woke too but that came much later than that.
Makes me wanna watch "Major League"
Two reasons:
1. Heart broken almost winning it all jaded the fans
2. The dumb name change caving to the far left minority when the fans did not want it.
Number one is no excuse for fans to ditch their team. Number two is completely legitimate and the only reason I don't support this organization anymore.
Number one is stupid. I'm not even an Indians fan, but I remember that late 90s team more than a lot of years of my favorite team (Cardinals). Those were some of the most talented teams I've ever seen.
Naw, man, the fans love the new name.
@@0531jos In a pigs eye.
A Midwest sports franchise changes their near 100 year old branding to appease coastal leftists. Brilliant strategy.
...which has nothing to do with a very longstanding attendance issue, but nice try.
because they decided to go woke ,
@@arky5610 the attendance has been an issue for YEARS. Since way before the name change. The name change has nothing to do with this, nice try
@@reh303 You're a fool if you think the name and logo change hasn't had an effect.
Un huh.
You do know, right, that most Native Americans don't live in the east.
Changing the name and signing a contract with Bally Sports were two of the dumbest decisions ever. I grew up watching the Indians on our local channels pretending to be the players I could name in their batting order.
I believe Bally Sports bought out Fox Sports Ohio
The most interesting thing is that Bally Sports Great Lakes was once Sports Time Ohio which was owned by the Cleveland Indians. Sports Time Ohio was then sold to Fox then Sinclair which formed a subsidiary company called Diamond Sports which owns Bally Sports. The now Cleveland Guardians should have kept Sports Time Ohio.
Changing the name and logo was the worst thing this organization could've done. The Indians and Chief Wahoo were literally iconic across America. For a penny pinching owner, that's a real head-scratcher. I hope he regrets it every day of his life!
@@marcjsolis I’m talking before that. In the 90s it was on basic cable, same channel as the local news. Channel 8 where I grew up. No sports time this bally sports that. Local fkn free channel
@@amazingeric97 before all that it was on basic cable. Local news channel that was free. Screw all the sports broadcasting companies
I think the new name change will do a lot of damage in the future regardless if you agree with it or not
They shoulda just retired the logo
Facts
@@zch7491they retired Chief Wahoo a couple years before the name change.
Totally agree with you, that change of its name lost their identity. I hope that revert sometime in the future, the Braves and Blackhawks don’t change their names they fought. Come on some say Indians are disgraceful for the native americans like Redskin, I only see two franchises who lose their connection with communities.
@@Marketex1I don’t understand the change if they retire the logo.
The Guardians that name say no more. Cleveland you really dropped the ball.
I'm shocked there are still some ppl who support this woke organization. No one should be going to these games until they revert the wokeness.
@@Rye-jl2fk What does wokeness even mean?
Baseball was at its peak in the 90s
Thank you Steroid Era!!
I grew up a Jim Thome fan in the mid-late 90s from New York. I so fondly recall these days. The stadium was wild every night. Loved the dark infield dirt seasons at the Jake.
Havent been since they changed the name.
Thank you for supporting the Indians and Chief Wahoo. You're a true fan!
@@Rye-jl2fk #KeeptheChief End the practice of finding hate where it doesn't exist.
Two problems caused this:
- Changing the stadium name from Jacobs Field to Progressive Corporation (headquartered in the Cleveland suburb of Mayfield Village, Ohio) Field
- Changing the team name from the Indians to the Guardians
🤦♂️
the attendance was terrible for YEARS, since the mid 2000s. the name change has nothing to do with it. just look at the espn attedance figures. they've been towards the bottom in attendance for almost 20 years
Maybe the DEI name changed hurt the attendance?
The attendance issues far pre-date the name change. Stop huffing Newsmax fumes.
The attendance was terrible for AGES far before the name change. This has been an issue for over 20 years
It's like "woke" something you never heard of before a few years ago.
@@alexandergilles8583Most Phillies fans don't live in Philadelphia. But the Phillies have no trouble getting suburbanites to show up for games.
@@yvonneplant9434 ok and? good for them?
'Go woke, get broke'... Indian fans left after the name change. 😂
you're timeline is off, the dropoff in attendance happened before the name change to Guardians
@@williamlambert take the L!
Your timeline is off by almost 15 years.
The falloff in attendance has far more to do with a consistently poor product on the field, Indians or Guardians doesn’t matter much. If the ownership would spend the money to build up the team into a contender the fans will come back, the 455 streak proved it.
@@stevenundisclosed6091Your grammar is off but if you think changing the name and logo didn't further destroy support for this team you're nuts. No one wants to support this woke team with no identity.
Couple of thoughts from a season ticket holder...
- You have to remember the sell out streak was for a superior on field product, yes, but also coincided with the years the Browns were gone and some of the worst Cavs teams to date. What else was there to do?
- Yes the shipping containers were ugly
- The downtown and the surrounding areas (Ohio City, Tremont, Gordon Square, etc.) are experiencing a revival of population that hasn't been seen in Cleveland since the mid 20th century. No one (figure of speech) actually lived downtown in the 90's, so I wouldn't really go as far as saying that the overall city population declining had much to do with the attendance problem.
- A lot of these people moving (back) downtown are younger people who grew up in the suburbs as Cleveland sports fans. This younger population may lack the interest in baseball that the fans of the 90's had, but enjoys a cheap dog and a beer as much as the next guy. The new renovations are aimed at getting this casual fan into the ball park as much as possible with food/drink deals and monthly standing room only passes (hence expanded standing room only areas).
- Getting as close as you can to the bullpens as the stadium allows is actually pretty cool and creates an intimacy and ability to interact with the players you don't get many other places. Watching Clase warm up for a save at eye level, only 10 feet away, is something any baseball fan could appreciate.
- People are just generally upset with what the Dolans have done with the team and have lost interest. Whether it's right or wrong, we Clevelanders are a stubborn species.
It's right
This is the best comment here. You hit upon the key reasons for the attendance decline when it occurred.
Thank you for being someone who understands that the name change has nothing to do with the decline
Great analysis.
Sellouts are no more with the Cleveland Guardians.
They are not the Guardians!
@@johnsikora4235 Um, what R they.???
@@marblox9300the Redskins
@@marblox9300Indians!
As a White Sox fan it still bothers me that the Indians didn't win in 2016. Not because I dislike the Cubs but because Cleveland had the better team. Injuries really hampered them in the WS. Not having their best hitter and 2 starting pitchers. And I have no idea how the legendary 90s team never won 🤷🏻
Other than Jose Ramirez, what other players on the Indians or Guardians has the team actually invested in? It became a bargain team and people stopped coming to see games.
You need to look at how tickets were sold during the 455 game run. I remember being out in the street looking for a ticket and dealt with scalpers holding stacks of brand new 7:08 tickets for the upper decks that were 3 inches thick. Somehow large amounts of tickets were distributed to ticket brokers at a deep discount and then accounted for as sold in order to chase that record. Once the team went down then that practice wasn’t worth the effort nor were the fans interested in sitting in the nose bleeds to watch a poo team.
The first home games after this video was posted, Cleveland had their first sellout. Then, the next home weekend against the Nats, two more sellouts! It’s like the Gods felt your love and brought the fans back!
The worst stadium tho? Cmon man. Obviously it isn’t the sell out Jacobs field. But to call it the worst is pretty wild. Still a beautiful ballpark with a great team. The owners just don’t spend money. Still gorgeous tho in person when you’re there
Correct
Yeah what happens when you go from an ICONIC NAME TO A GENERIC AHHH NAME
Don't forget the iconic logo too. Best in baseball.
@@Rye-jl2fk agreed
You might not like how the renovations in the upper deck look but to say it isn’t an improvement is silly. It gives fans that buy tickets in those sections food beverage and dans shop options which make upper deck tickets, which are more affordable, more enticing. It makes the experience better for fans and the hope is they sell more tickets bc of that
Same thing happened to the Blue Jays. Crazy attendance for the first few years after the Dome opened... you couldn't get a ticket. The dome was brand new... a technological marvel... we were "world class" after years of suffering in Exhibition Stadium. Then after 1994 attendance fell off a cliff... poorer record after the World Series wins... the 1994 strike... and the opening of Camden Yards that made the dome suddenly feel outdated.
Taking out the seats and renovating it cost money. Empty seats waiting for an exciting on field product doesn’t cost anything. Should have left a good design alone. Baseball shouldn’t be about a “circus environment”. It should be about a great team and good marketing. Jacob’s Field was great the way it was.
Thank you for your work.
Here's what these teams can do to bring fans in. A. Make is affordable for a family of 4 to go to the ballpark.
1. Tickets $80 a piece minimum for bad seats.
2. Parking $50
3. Food $100
At the end of the day your dropping at least $500 for 1 game.
- you can get tickets under $50 even with weekend games fairly often on the resale market
- $50 parking is definitely not the case in cleveland. unless you want really good parking. more like $15-20.
- stadium food is usually overpriced.
you can do it for a family of four in Cleveland and many other markets for like $300, less with some promotions.
@UserName-ts3sp I live in Mass and you definatley can't do that at Fenway, but yeah in other cities you can for sure, but right now even at $300 total for a game, how many times a month are you going to drop $300 to go to a game? Most families will go once or twice a year.
Blame Biden
Boy do i really miss that 90's era. I was in my early 20's and would hang out downtown in the flats. ( A group of bars). A lot of the Indians players would go down there and hang out with everyone. And going to the games was just so insane. Never experienced anything like it before or ever since. Was truly an amazing time in my life. So sad to see the stadium vacant, especially since the Indians/Guardians are doing well. I feel bad for the players, they deserve better.
Man being an Indians fan my whole life it’s been hard to watch the decline with poor ownership a horrible name change and an unwillingness to spend money not just on free agents but to keep talent has been a 20yr kick in the dick. Hopefully when the Dolans sell to the minority owner in a few years that changes things. I still get pissed when I think about Paul Dolan telling reporters they would spend money when people come and support the team. That was such an opposite backwards way of running a baseball team. They are douches.
You shouldn't support this woke organization at all until they bring back the rightful name and logo. Dolan is exactly what you called him so stop giving him your money.
Until the team is called the “Indians” again, nobody should give this absolute garbage ownership a penny.
I agree.😊
They have like a monument park in centerfield that I think they did a great job on. This stadium very much still holds up in todays mlb. It’s one of my favorites honestly
Music makes it seem like you’re a horror channel
It is a horror show, look at these stadiums 🏟️
MLB.....HAS become a horror show / horror story / in so many ways.
Weren’t the Browns gone during this time and the Cavs were awful
Good point. Browns had left and Cavs did not have James yet.
So you can’t be a fan of more than one sport?
More dollars spent on Indians then, Browns fans were irate
New name, cheap ownership, cheap team payroll, and subpar season after season....
Pretty sure those are reasons for attendance shitting the bed before the stadium issues come to mind.
People are moving back into downtown with all of the construction of high rise residential buildings.
Take a look at the Pirates.
Top rated stadium... Shit owner, shit team, both equal horrid attendance.
Cleveland has the 4th most wins in MLB over the last decade. What are these subpar seasons you’re speaking of?
Hey, I remember the days of Tony Horton and Joe Azcue.
There WAS nothing wrong with the park. It was one of the best parks in baseball before they started hacking it up
3.50ish gas - I live in Hudson/Stow area. To go the game and pay for parking - parking is like 10-20 bucks, gas is 10 bucks. I can't take the bus or train from here either. In 1995 it was like 1 dollar for gas and parking was 5-10 bucks. But I always went to 1-2 games a year, and continue to go to 1-2 games a year. My attendance hasn't dipped. I'll also say that Cleveland weather is better in the summer which impacts attendance.
I went to many Indians games in the mid to late 90’s. After the 2001 season, it was like the magic left and never really returned. There were some good years along the way to be sure, but that fevered feeling we had for our Indians from 1994-2001 never returned.
And its so disheartening because the team has far and away been the most consistent team of the 3 in cleveland over the last 30 years. I mean they have the 4th highest win percentage in baseball over the last decade. But it's like the city just does not care one bit about them. You have a 100 win team in 2017 than only pulls an average of 58% capacity. that's just not acceptable
Tribe still has the legitimate sellout streak.
Because the tickets are too expensive, back in the day they weren’t anymore than five dollars if they make the tickets cheap people may sellout the ball park again 😮
Jacobs field was the envy of the league when it first opened. I believe players ranked it as the best stadum in baseball as late as 2008. You couldnt buy a ticket in cleveland for years. Had to be on a waiting list. Still looks good to me after 30 years.
Just imagine the old Cleveland Municipal Stadium that had like 80k seats and you had like a couple thousand people in the stadium. 😂
Just like the movie major league ,stick up advertising bill boards to cover empty seats who was the Einstein idiot that decided this 🤯 The organization took a beautiful stadium and turned it into a dumpster fire 😮😢
I'm surprised they haven't banned the movie Major League yet because they use the Indians team in it.. lmao such idiots 😊
“They’re throwing warmup pitches. Is it really that interesting?” 😂😂😂😂
Must not be watching the team this year.. Last Saturday was sold out for the first May sell out since 2011.. Seems to me they are doing a lot better on attendance than most think.. Can't blame pricing either with 49$ monthly pass to all home games.
The team died when they changed the name. Anyone who still is a fan is a total and complete jackahhhhs
Agreed.
When they dropped the Indians name I think the franchise took a hit. Like calling the Cubs the Mice. Chicago Mice.
@@marblox9300 Better the Chicago mice than the Cleveland Guardians.
@@marblox9300 agreed
@@PittsburghMarky also agreed lmao
I think part of this is them changing to the name. A lot of Clevelanders are upset with the change.
The Dolans suck. If they just spent mid level MLB money on the club who knows how good they could have been since 2010.
Perfect example of how to turn off a fan base. Issue continues to be competitive balance. When you have teams like the Yankees and Dodgers spending three times as much and landing all the players people want to see, people lose interest. In the 80s and 90s even early 2020s it was still somewhat plausible for teams like Indians to compete, now it just is not unless they get a really fluke year. They have also had bad management which does not help.
New to the channel, do all your baseball park videos have horror movie music lol?
As someone who’s been to progressive field a dozen+ times there are always a ton of people surrounding the bullpen throughout the game watching the pitchers including myself. It’s nice because you can watch them warm up and still watch the game
WOW! What a contrast!
I had been a fan since 1965. When they jettisoned Chief Wahoo and the name "Indians," I dropped them. I stayed true-they sold out. F-em!
to sum it all up for everyone: Dolans...
To sum it all up: the browns moved for 5 years and then they came back. End of story. Cleveland isn’t a big enough town to support 3 professional teams. The fans are supporting the browns as north east Ohio is a football area (football hall of fame is located here)
Why do I hate those toothbrush lights?
What's the scary music called ? Dome Doom?
Conjugation Station
The biggest issue is the ownership, they wanted to make money and were unwilling to pay to put a consistent winner on the field, then the name change did not help matters either
I use to love to show up early and heckle the opponents starting pitcher while he warmed up.
The Shipping Containers are absolutely disgusting. When I first saw them, I was like, What the Hell...?
we used to drive down from Toronto when the Blue Jays were in town - I remember enthusiastic fans and lots of full seats. Shame it has apparently changed.
Crazy what happens when you insult your fans calling them racists for liking a teams name, and then putting a bad product on the field because ownership is cheap.
Poor botched stadium renovations, and an overall disappointing team since they lost the WS in 2016 has led to this. Their success so far this year is pretty much blind luck.
YES! YES! A THOUSAND TIMES YES!
What is this bad product everyone in the comments is speaking of? Cleveland has been enormously successful the last 11 years. They just haven’t won a World Series
@@gnielsen07 It proves Shakespeare was wrong. A rose by another name does not smell as sweet.
@@PittsburghMarky I thought they should’ve renamed to the Tribe with a new logo. The guardians name was terrible. Nevertheless cleveland has the 4th highest winning pct in baseball since 2013. The product has been fine the fans don’t show because cleveland is too small to support mlb nba and nfl. Take the browns away again and the guardians would add 5,000 - 10,000 more fans a game
@@gnielsen07 Disagree.My goodness, they're trying to put three teams in Las Vegas an dits only the 38th largest market whereas Cleveland is in the Top 20. It's the name change AND the logo change. Period.
Absolutely perfect timing. That is what resulted in the Indians' 455 game sellout streak.
1.) Browns left town. The Indians filled some of the attendance void they left behind.
2.) Brand new (at the time) state of the art stadium.
3.) A team with historically significant offense just reaching its potential.
It was quite literally a perfect storm, in a good way, for the Indians. It's not a bad baseball town, but it's not on par with a similar sized market like St. Louis.
And it really sucks because that franchise has been far and away the best run and most consistent of the 3 cleveland teams for almost 30 years, yet the town just has never dove all in on them. They'll pack the completely irrelevant browns for 20 years, but then our one consistent team gets nothing. The 100 win 2017 team gets an average of 58% capacity. The 2017 browns went winless and still got 87% capacity average
They traded Rick Vaughn is what happened...
Wild Thang!
BoomBoomBoom
You make my heart sang!
Can you do a video of a possible relocation of the tribe?
I don't think the removed seating sections look clunky at all. The open space is kind of a breath of fresh air.
Music gives me creepy pasta vibes 😆
Wish they were still the Indians. I loved that Chief Wahoo logo
I've sat in many locations in this stadium over several games over the years. I once sat late game, first row of that third deck in right field, just to check the vantage point. It was a flat out, terrible seat...far too removed from the action. A third renovation should just remove that third deck in right field entirely.
It seems like the upper decks in most ball parks are obsolete now. Stadiums should only seat about 25,000 - 35,000 max now.
Only dodgers and Yankees need that.
I'm gonna add to what I'm pretty sure are many comments pointing out the obvious.. Things are not gonna get any better after they took down chief wahoo and then eventually the name IT DOES MATTER. It is a big deal and there's no conversation to be had about it.
The Cleveland Indians were a storied franchise and made up the face of mlb having an entire movie series showcase their Franchise brand. This team should relocate somewhere else If the current fans of Cleveland did not do enough to step up and protest the BS.
There was an ownership change. There was a massive shift in the economy of NE Ohio, and the Browns came back. Couple that with the Indians being a bad team for several years and that explains the attendance drop.
You didn't even mention the elephant in the room (the horrendous rebrand that nobody wanted.)
Hmmmm, how about not caving in to PC??? The Cleveland Indians were a lasting baseball ⚾️ team for decades... call it Karma??
Changing the name was a disasterous move.. Gooo YANKEES!
5:21 Remember, the final product *never* looks as good as the rendering.
The sellout streak was a confluence of a perfect storm of events. The Browns moved away, the team got good for the first time in 40 years, a brand new stadium that was arguably the best in baseball when it opened, Cavs weren’t good, etc. Outside of the 40-50s and mid 90s-early 00’s, Cleveland has never had good attendance. It’s not a baseball town. I think the latest round of renovations will be a good upgrade.
Cavs were a playoff team actually the Cavs got bad in like 98
the current team looks pretty good
6:24 That game is from July 12, 1998.
They are actually seeing an increase in downtown population that will continue over the next decade with all the buildings being converted to apartmens....a major issue is the consistent downtown workforce is dropping with more people able to work from home.
The population downtown has barely increased. Most people that move in do not stay. It's the most transient area of Cleveland.
Two words went wrong with the Indians……The Dolans
i think the new renovations are a great idea and dont look that bad. Better to have a bar area that might provide a better social environment and a reason to be there than a bunch of empty seats. those seats were useless aside from opening day and playoff games.
Removing right field upper deck seats just makes the ballpark cheap looking.
People talk about baseball’s financial system being the cause when that is not really true. If we look back Cleveland’s attendance began to crater shortly after the highs of 1954, the Indians were a terrible draw after Trader Lane gave up their star attraction. Than you had the Browns take over as Cleveland’s main sports attraction while the Indians went into the cellar, combine that with Cleveland’s population decline after that you have the ingredients for Cleveland’s initial attendance woes.
Now when did the Indians see an attendance rebound? When the Browns left, the sellout streak began the year the Browns left and ended in 2001 when people thought the Browns were in the rebound. Cleveland is a market which will favor a good Browns team over middling Indians teams and that was shown, combine that with population decline etc, that’s what caused it.
I’ll argue that the lack of inclusion in MLB’s postseason system between 1969 and really 2021 is one of the main reasons small markets failed and loss ground to other sports, every other league had postseasons in which more than only 4 teams had the opportunity to make the postseason, you’re going to take losses in the markets you share with the NBA, NFL and NHL, but MLB maintained that rigid structure for decades and took the losses, after 1981 a Wild Cars should’ve been instituted, that would have saved interest in cities, by at least adding more postseason teams. Fans are quick to blame high spending owners who are doing what they should to maintain a team when that’s not the cause of disinterested fans, it’s decades of frankly meaningless seasons caused by a rigid postseason system, terrible owners, over-embracing the RSN model etc.
The focus is all on drinking and standing around talking or phones instead of watching a game as the main event. Oh and the Cleveland restaurants inside the stadium that cost more than the same business would in its original location.
Huh, it's almost like there was a few major movies during that time promoting the team......
a lot of people in the comments are pointing the finger on numerous different things regarding the low atttendance. the botttomline is this, the sellout streak was literally the perfect storm. Browns had skipped town leaving a rabid city desperate for some kind of positive sports story to rally around. The team had superstars and championship caliber talent contending every year. Most importantly, they had a brand new stadium that was state of the art and the place to be. there are statistical studies proving that there is a "honeymoon phase" of attendance boosts whenever a new stadium is built for any team not just cleveland or MLB. This is what led to the sellout streak, and once the talent went away, rebuilding started, the new stadiums shine started to wear off, the browns came back, the cavs got lebron, all of this led to attendance dropping back down. I say "back" down because before jacobs field, our attendance was terrible for decades and decades at municipal. high attendance was never the norm in cleveland and everyone forgot that. furthermore, add on the fact that baseball in general has had attendance issues, and is desperate to turn that around with pitch clocks and what not, the new generation of americans just arent into baseball or sports as the old ones. heck they are more interested in watching someone play madden than to watch an actual nfl game seems like.
Baseball is just not what it used to be. Some cities built very expensive stadiums and they can't sell tickets.
I feel like we gotta out into consideration at least for this year that the nba team right across the street that is literally in the playoffs takes most of the fans and also this isn’t the prime weather for Cleveland
The ownership of the Dolan's didn't help when they went against the fans wishes and abandoned the team logo and nickname.
What many people forget is the majority of those 455 sellouts came when there was no football team in town. Then by 2004 LeBron was in town. Cleveland is the poorest city in the US, there just isn’t enough money to consistently go to everything.
Cleveland is not even close to the poorest city in the US but your Lebron and Browns point are valid.
Attendance issue has little to do with the success of the team. They’re almost always competitive and the attendance didn’t change dramatically when they were playing the World Series or the year after that. The attendance sharply declined after 2001. What happened at that time?
Well in the 90s the city was considered a “comeback” city. But prior to 2000 it was slowing down and people were moving out to the Suburbs. While the metro area is still one of the largest in the country the city itself was declining enough that they lost the qualification for a lot of federal economic support. In 2001 there was a big shift in Cleveland politics when the mayor left office to farm alpacas… and a large portion of Cleveland’s politicians that hold offices today began their careers around that time…
Basically the issue is that the city declined in population and the city officials have done a poor job at enticing business/corporations/jobs to move to the city and ultimately the city has just continued to age. People don’t look at Cleveland as a place of opportunity so no one’s moving here and bc no one lives there and the people that do live there don’t have a lot of career opportunities the sports franchises, which are one of the cities biggest economic drivers, so they aren’t attended games they can’t afford that have also become more accessible to viewers from home since 2000…
@@Marketex1 wrong. Cleveland has been mostly 1st (but a few times second) for almost 20 years in percentage of residents living in poverty, averaging around 31%. The only thing not even close is your comment.
Those 90’s Indians were a spectacle to behold. Home Run Derby.
I don’t think that this name-change was a good-thing for them.
Ruined one of the better stadiums. It is now rock bottom in thesame tier as the Trop. It looks like a junker now. So sad.
Clevelanders claim the (temporary) loss of the Browns was what drove the sellout streak........
100% fact
i mean thats what happened
Indians are gone, the reds are Ohio’s baseball team.
Lmao the standings say otherwise
The reds suck
Dammit youtube 😂😂😂😂😂😂 I said the reds suck it's not hurting anyone
The reds suck.... I'll keep typing this
problem is you dont' need many seats anymore. 10K-20K seems good.. nothing more. plus with how cost has gone up not everyone can afford to even go to games anymore. i rather go to a minor league AAA to partner leagues. its cheeper and get some nice games.
Thank the woke mob
But mostly thank the ownership for catering to the woke mob.
I suppose they're in danger of reloKAYtion now huh ?
It could be in the future
As much as I agree they should’ve kept the Indians name I still can’t understand why they chose the Guardians over the Spiders. The Cleveland Spiders would’ve had some cool options for uniforms and logos
The Spiders were one of the worst teams of all time, they didn’t wanna go back to that
@@8thWunduh The name is much cooler though
To me, the biggest factor in the sellout streak was the absence of the Browns. Cleveland has always been a football-first city regardless of how the team was performing which is disappointing. The Indians/Guardians have put far more competitive teams on the field than the Browns during the last 25 years and yet, the Browns always get the support no matter what.
it's really irritating honestly. Doesn't matter how bad that team was for 20 years, everyone came to them no matter what. But the baseball team spends the last 25 years completely unable to drawn even 60%
I’m also completely baffled by the fans, when it comes to this fact…it’s been consistently a terrible product for TWENTY FIVE YEARS, and the fans continue to show up and pay ridiculous prices for the garbage result week after week-and then COMPLAIN about it 😂😂😂
@@GP9167 yeah like the baseball team has had a couple dips here and there, but by and large since the mid 90s has been pretty successful. The browns on the other hand haven't done ANYTHING. Yet they're the team people flock to