Faceoff

Question #102: Is it gluttony?

November

Honestly, as a Yankees fan, or a fan of any team—but particularly the Yankees—do you feel just a little lousy about the way they plan to rebuild their team, by simply throwing ridiculous, stupid amounts of money at ballplayers. By just blowing the other teams out of the water with their checkbook?

Wouldn’t you rather that they had to use their brains and their resources other than money?

Isn’t it enough that you won’t be able to afford seats in the new Yankee Stadium? If you can afford them now, you won’t be able to in 2010 or 2011.

And hasn’t sports reached the point of gross pig-ish-ness? I mean, PSLs, ticket prices, late night World Series games. Not to mention that Citi Group announced it will lay off 53,000 workers, while it is spending millions upon millions for naming rights to the Mets’ new ballpark.

I’m disgusted. Are you?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 18th, 2008 at 12:38 pm by Carp. |

One Response to “Question #102: Is it gluttony?”

sunny615 November 18th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
I’m fairly disgusted myself, but it is what it is: a business first. They all do what they can to milk the be-jeebees out of every fan that’s painfully addicted to their sport(s) of choice. Every single fan out there has the ability to just say “no thanks” and walk away. There is not one logical reason that they should reasonably consider paying the prices that they pay.

But the word fan – excerpt of fanatic – is so named for a reason. And fanatics they are (including myself). Paying ridiculous prices for tickets, jerseys, posters, bobble-heads, mugs, shot glasses, wrist bands, hats, hard hats, foam fingers, and other ridiculous periphenalia.

Unlike other teams, one of the weapons the Yankees (Red Sox, and probably Angels/Dodgers) have is big bank accounts. If they have that cash, who am I as a fan to say – don’t use that? Every team does deals to get players they want because winning teams mean bigger sales. Giants – Eli Manning. Mets – Johan Santana. Jets – Brett Favre. Yankees – everyone not named Phil (i.e., Hughes and Coke). “It’s not my money” is a pretty common theme among those in denial.

Of course sports does this in the name of catering to it’s fans because they know that the fan is crazy/stupid enough to pay the money (for tickets/merchandise) if their team goes to the Superbowl, World Series, or other championship venues. Has it gotten out of hand? It got out of hand waaaay back a couple of decades ago. Should fans be outraged? Most definitely, but not enough to override their fandom. You have a better chance of getting a teen to stop dopwnloading those Jessica Simpson swimsuit pictures than you would a Yankee/Giants etc. fan to give up watching their team play. Fans are funny creatures. They’re smart enough know they’re being swindled, but only when they’re not watching their teams. And since sports now are almost year around (including drafts, off-season trades, summer mini-camps, mini-mini camps, spring training, etc) – finding a smart fan would be like finding an uncorrupt politican in Washington DC.

It is a condition of your use of the comment features associated with the blogs that you do not: Use the site to post or transmit any unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane or indecent information of any kind, including without limitation any transmissions constituting or encouraging conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, give rise to civil liability or otherwise violate any local, state, national or international law. You alone are responsible for the material you post or send. Refer to the Terms of Service.