Red Sox set to break MLB sellout record
The 456th consecutive sellout at Fenway Park will break the record set by the Cleveland Indians' die-hards, who packed Jacobs Field for all 455 home games played from June 12, 1995-April 2, 2001.
Records are made to be broken I guess, but this sucks.
over 3 years ago
bogey021
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Yeah, but it’s more like 456*, because they have a smaller stadium so this is being done with less people.
Have your cheap record, Sawx Nation. We had more people.
Steel Nick
Yeah, that’s the ticket. Plus, the Boston MSA is twice as big as the Cleveland MSA and 33% bigger than the Cleveland-Akron-Elyria CSA, so they had a greater supply of people with which to fill their smaller stadium, so we still win. Also, they suck.
At first, I thought this ‘my stadium can beat up your stadium’ banter was funny, but then I did some research. It’s not as trivial a gripe as it may seem to be at first blush.
Fenway has a different capacity for day games v. night games. They need to cover some of the seats in the bleachers during day games to create a batter’s eye. They’ve been constantly expanding the capacity since 2001. When the streak started on May 15, 2003, it was 34,898(night) & 34,482(day). It went to 35,095(night) & 34,679(day) in 2004, 36,108(night) & 35,692(day) in 2006, 36,525(night) & 36,109(day) in 2007, and 36,984 (day) & 37,400 (night) this year.
Allowing for the playoff games in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2007, they would have played to 49 sellouts in 2003. They’ve played 67 home games so far this season. Figures for 2004 to 2007 are easy to find. I took their reported attendance for each season from B-ref.
In 2003 and this year, I assumed about a third of the games were day and two thirds were night games and calculated the attendance as 1,703,207 at sell outs in 2003 and 2,496,509 this year.
That makes the total attendance at Fenway during the streak 15,786,241.
The capacity at the Jake (since the entire streak took place before the name change) was 43,345. It’s even easier to figure attendance during that streak since it ended right after opening day in 2001. Opening day attendance in 2001 was 42,606. Again, I got the annual attendance figures from B-ref for all years other years except 1995. Allowing for playoff games during the streak, there were 29 sell outs during the first year of the streak.
Crunching those numbers, attendance at the Jake during the streak was 18,414,568.
That means 2,628,327 more fans attended games in Cleveland during our streak than have been to Fenway during theirs. That’s more than half the population of the Greater Boston or about half a million more than the population of Greater Cleveland.
Looking at it another way, that means that Boston would have to sellout another 71 home games – nearly an entire season – before their attendance at sellouts surpassed ours.
"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.
by Harry Doyle on Sep 4, 2008 5:37 PM EDT up reply actions 6 recs
It gets tricky with the Jake seating capacity numbers, because of the temporary bleacher stands that were propped in CF, and the two additional bleacher sections (I can’t recall if they were added for ‘96 or ’97). Even still you’ve probably got a number that’s very close. Nice work.
Every year at the Jake except 1995 were just the hard numbers from the annual reported attendance. That was easy because every game of the year from 1996 to 2000 was a sell out, so attendance at sold out games were equal to annual attendance. Even 2001 at the Jake was easy because, unfortunately, the streak ended after opening day, so only one game was a sell out during the streak, and opening day attendance was easy to find.
I had to fudge 1995 at the Jake and 2003 and this year at Fenway, since neither of those are years where every game was sold out. I could probably come up with a hard number for this year at Fenway as well, since attendance to date is probably published somewhere – I just didn’t take the time to look for it.
I’m more confident in the number for Cleveland than the one for Boston since, among other things only one year is estimated and I didn’t have to vary attendance for day games v. night games.
The numbers I came up with are probably not precise, but but they are probably not off by more than a few ten thousands out of figures over 15 million.
"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.
Well, to be fair – what – what did I just say that? those Fenway tickets are god awful expensive. Back in the day you could go to the Jake for ten bucks.
Resident LGT beer kinda sewer
I was there when they retired the number 455. During a Saturday game where we beat the Royals to start 2002 at 10-1 (I think). Despite that hot start, the Jake was only half full on a weekend game.
Even though we had a hot start, it sure didn’t feel like I was watching the same team from the past. It really felt like an era had ended.
It didn’t seem possible that a team could break that streak in my lifetime. It seemed almost magical that all the conditions came together in Cleveland to make it happen. Congrats to Red Sox fans.
this hsould be the highest recced post of the year
by Gradyforpresident on Sep 4, 2008 4:53 PM EDT up reply actions
Wow. On any given 10 acre parcel of land in Miami there must be at least 600 people doing something. Could it be that the team is actually displacing people?
by jhon on Sep 4, 2008 2:54 PM EDT up reply actions 5 recs
Einstein said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You’re playing a baseball game in September between two teams that have no shot at the playoffs. It’s 90 degrees and 85% humidity. How many people could they expect to show up.
"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.
Still, you have to see the humor in jhon’s point … that if they hadn’t built the stadium on that land at all, more than 600 people probably would have been in that space.
I loved jhon’s point, and he’s right. People are staying away from Marlins games in droves.
I was replying to Voltaire’s apparent disbelief that it had happened again. Nothing’s changed in south Florida. The team’s out of it. They were playing an opponent that is more dead than they are. It’s hot and uncomfortable to sit outside. I’m sure the beer’s expensive. Unless they change something it’s not going to get better, and I don’t suppose that lowering the beer prices would bring many more people to the ball park (present company excluded).
"It's hard to win when you don't score." Cliff Lee, 9/28/05.
you were the strict beer season guy right? see i almost enjoy those discussions more than talking about the indians.
by Gradyforpresident on Sep 6, 2008 3:53 PM EDT up reply actions
I haven’t had a PBR in a while. Lots of Hefeweizens though.
by Gradyforpresident on Sep 6, 2008 4:28 PM EDT up reply actions
That’s funny, I just had my first two a couple nights ago.
by Jay on Sep 6, 2008 4:57 PM EDT up reply actions
First two for the summer, right? You can’t possibly mean of all time.
by Gradyforpresident on Sep 6, 2008 5:14 PM EDT up reply actions
No, I don’t recall having them before. Plenty of other wheats, of course. I do enjoy a nice wheat in the summer, like lemonade.
by Jay on Sep 6, 2008 9:11 PM EDT up reply actions
A friend of mine that works for the Red Sox informed me that ownership consistenly bought unsold tickets to keep the streak going. FWIW
Hello Roger,
If that is true, then I think an asterisk, or at least, us remembering this fact should help us to feel a little better, since I too thought that our streak would not be broken for some time, if ever. I’m not sure Indians’ management ever had to buy tickets to keep the streak going, since Indians’ tickets were extremely popular at that time (plus the fact the Cavaliers were mediocre and the Browns were poor in 1995 and then gone for the next 3 seasons, then poor again in 1999 and 2000).
I wonder if the Indians’ sellout streak would have continued longer if we had reached the postseason in 2000 (just one additional win from doing so) or if the Browns’ 3rd season in 2001 would have still led to our sellout streak ending at the time it did?
Just my 2 cents.
The "cream of the crop" doesn't always rise to the top.
During the streak I had the number of a guy who worked for the Indians that handled group sales. Whenever I needed tickets I’d call the guy up. He’d sell me a block – usually 10-20 seats – of seats at face value. These seats were often corporate seats that company didn’t need for a particular game so they’d give the tickets back to the Indians for resale. And it didn’t make any difference who the Indians were playing. I got twelve seats to a Yankee’s game back in ’95.
Any way the point is that even during sellout streaks, most teams still have seats – ya just gotta know who to call.
Resident LGT beer kinda sewer
On any given game I’d wager the Indians— any club, likely —“own” at least 50-75 seats at gametime. Probably more.
Steel Nick
It seems impossible to get a ticket to Fenway unless you know someone or are willing to pay a lot of money to a broker. I would guess the team would do what the Tribune Co. does with the Cubs, and buy seats and sell them to brokers. The seats are fully occupied, either way.
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