Losing and fan loyalty in baseball

Take me out to the ballgame.

It’s a phrase customarily sung, but not as often spoken in earnest.

The experience of witnessing a baseball game in person is completely unparalleled. The yard evokes eternal summer by day, and at night the stadium lights glow like a Christmas tree.

Baseball games aren’t deafeningly raucous the way football and basketball games are, and their high-energy moments come in smaller and more infrequent bursts. Still, they are usually family affairs where kids can bring their gloves, while the more sophisticated crowd can still maintain conversation at a near-normal decibel level.

So, it is with heavy hearts that sports fans acknowledge the end of an era.

The Boston Red Sox announces yesterday that after ten years, their sellout streak (the longest in professional sports) finally came to a close at 820 games—794 regular-season and 26 postseason games. It shouldn’t matter if you’re a Yankees fan; that’s a tremendous and unrivaled feat.

Loving sports comes at a price. Aside from the fact that it takes its toll on us emotionally, being a fan can put a major dent in our budget. This year, that statement rings especially true. According to the AP, the average ticket price for a Major League Baseball game rose 2.7 percent from 2012.

Understandably, that makes the Sox’s streak so impressive; fans were willing to fork out the year in and year out. But what changed? Here’s a hint: it’s not the price bump (even though Boston has the highest average ticket price).

To put it bluntly, it’s because the Sox started to suck—by their recent standards. Boston ended 2012 on an eight game losing streak, one that sunk them 26 games behind the division-leading Yankees. Since the streak started in 2003, the Sox hadn’t plummeted past third place in the American League East or dropped below a .500 winning percentage. They did both last year.

Is it a coincidence that the streak ends following their worst performance in a decade? My guess is no. What’s even sadder than snapping ten years of the best streak in professional sports is the lack of so-called team loyalty. That’s not to slam Red Sox fans for being discouraged by a losing record, as it’s a universal problem that transcends all sports. But for the sake of argument, I’ll direct the following diatribe at Boston.

When the going gets tough, the fans get going. Going away. Let’s be clear here, it’s not unreasonable to dislike when your team loses. But here’s a thought: those fans that stick around even when their team is slumping truly should be proud of themselves (here’s looking at you, Cubs fans).

For fans that stuck with a cursed Red Sox team for all those years of the unlikely, the improbable, and the seemingly downright impossible: what gives? Don’t change your stripes now. Seasons are long, and there’s a lifetime of baseball ahead. After all, it took you 86 years to bring home a championship. Patience is a virtue, and I think you guys know it.

So here’s to the diehards: die hard no matter how many you’ve got in the loss column. It always counts.