Paul Oberjuerge header image 2

Time for Dodgers to Reward Their Fans

October 20th, 2020 · No Comments · Baseball, Dodgers

In 2015 it was 3,764,815.

In 2016 it was 3,703,312.

In 2017 it was 3,765,856.

In 2018 it was 3,857,500.

Last year, it was 3,974,309.

Since 1988, it is 103,379,514.

Or 103 million, 379 thousand, 5 hundred and 14.

What are those numbers?

The number of regular-season tickets purchased by Dodgers fans since their team last won a World Series championship — in 1988. Which was just the other day … 32 years ago.

Kirk Gibson and Orel Hershiser roamed the greensward that year. So did Steve Sax and Mike Scioscia and Tim Leary and Mike Marshall.

Behind Gibson’s memorable home run in Game 1 (“I don’t believe what I just saw!”) and two lights-out pitching performances by Hershiser, the Dodgers defeated the heavily favored Oakland Athletics in five games, bringing a fifth championship to Los Angeles.

They also won in L.A. in 1959, 1963, 1965 and 1981.

So, they don’t have to wait a generation-plus before winning again. It can be done here and now. And it is high time that it is.

The Dodgers owe that to their fans, arguably the best in baseball and perhaps of all American sports.

Their fans demonstrate their allegiance by spending gobs of money on their team, which allows them to rake in millions of dollars in ticket revenue (in non-pandemic years).

The average price of a Dodgers ticket in 2019, according to statista.com, was $42.62. And fans bought 3,974,309 of them, a club record.

The club also happily takes parking fees ($25, on average) and sells expensive food and drink, and caps and replica jerseys, etc. They have a license to print money, thanks to their fans — who have remained loyal despite the Dodgers’ long Fall Classic drought.

All for a team that hasn’t won a championship since Reagan’s second term.

The Dodgers are in the playoffs for the eighth-consecutive season after an eighth-consecutive division championship and will be playing in the World Series for the third time in four years when the Series with the Tampa Bay Rays commences tonight.

A handful of Dodgers fans will have found their way to Texas to buy one of the 11,000-or-so tickets available at Globe Life Field in Arlington. The rest of Dodgers Nation will be able to see their team on prime-time TV.

“This is our year” seems to be a slogan that has been taken up by the players, and after 32 years we certainly hope they can make it so.

They owe a debt to fans, of love and trophies.

Is this the year the fans are repaid?

Tags:

0 responses so far ↓

  • There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.

Leave a Comment