Bud Selig: please use your head
Bud Selig’s attempt to run Major League Baseball into the ground was plainly obvious this weekend.
Selig and his administration decided to send the Detroit Tigers to Arizona to play the defending World Series Champion Diamondbacks.
The Tigers, Diamondbacks series drew 131,038 fans in a three games, which is 43,679 a game. I know how excited all those fans in Arizona were to see Robert Fick and all but imagine if the Diamondbacks played in Detroit.
This series saw Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson pitch for the Diamondbacks; what if they pitched in Comerica Park?
The Tigers boast the 26th highest attendance in Major League Baseball, just four away from the cellar. If Schilling and Johnson pitch at Comerica, the Tigers attendance would raise just a little bit.
The Diamondbacks have no problem drawing at home with more than 1,288,000 fans so far this season. But they also draw on the road as more than 1,100,000 have seen them on the road.
If Selig and his staff would use their heads for something else and schedule these Interleague games differently, maybe just maybe there would be no attendance problems other than in Montreal.
Now, I can’t guarantee attendance would be higher with all the Red Wings fans celebrating the cup, but at least Tigers fans could have seen some good pitching (other than Jeff Weaver).
The Tigers have drawn 629,104 fans at home compared to 764,533 on the road. Meaning that either there are a lot of Tigers fans in other parts of the country, or the Tigers are playing a lot of teams that draw big crowds.
The Arizona series isn’t the only case about where the Tigers are playing a big name team that draws fans.
Tuesday, today and Thursday, the Tigers play the Atlanta Braves in Atlanta.
Braves fans have grown accustomed to watching great pitching over the years while the Tigers fans are accustomed to watching poor pitching.
I would love to see Maddux pitch but I would have to fly to Atlanta to see that.
Instead the Tigers get to host the Montreal Expos and Philadelphia Phillies in the middle of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. As tempting as Vlad Guerrero and Scott Rolen are to watch its just not the same as watching Schilling or Maddux pitch.
The Tigers should host both of these teams next year but why not break it up and even it out to host one this year and one next year?
In a week, the Tigers host the Pittsburgh Pirates, which will be the best competition the Tigers have had all season since playing the Kansas City Royals.
Selig himself doesn’t make the schedule but who ever does has the same ideas as he does: Run baseball into the ground.
As much as he says he doesn’t want to have to contract teams because they keep losing money it sure doesn’t look like he means it.
But Tigers fans look on the bright side: In September the New York Yankees come to town so maybe the Tigers will be able to draw a crowd then, oh wait, the players will be on strike by then.
LIFE Sports Editor Adam Trumble can be reached for comment at sports@cm-life.com.
