The slate of 45 MLB games last weekend drew more than 1.68 million fans, according to the league, setting a weekend attendance high in both total and average since August 2008. This underscores a growing trend that could be correlated with the renewed focus on game action and pace of play that was instituted before the 2023 season.
A slew of rule changes has limited defensive shifts, increased the size of bases and introduced a pitch timer, forcing pitchers to set up and deliver their throws more quickly. Before the 2024 season, the time limit for pitchers when there are runners on base was shortened even further.
One month into the current season, the average time of a nine-inning game was down to two hours and 36 minutes, one minute less than the 2023 average, which was 20 minutes less than the season before. MLB saw a 9.6% increase in attendance from 2022 to 2023 and attendance was up another 2% year-over-year between the first week of June of last year and at the same point this year. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what is propelling in-person attendance, but the trend suggests that the pace-of-play rule changes are driving more people to baseball games.
“My view is that the rule changes have been a driving force in terms of the attendance uptick,” MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said last year. “It’s really difficult to prove that assertion, but all I can tell you is that people literally continue to stop me, to reach out unprompted, to say that they are watching more baseball and attending more games because of the rule changes.”
Business Is Booming
And more than just in-person attendance has been trending up for MLB.
After setting a record gross revenue figure of more than $10 billion for the 2022 season, 2023’s revenue reportedly reached a record $11.6 billion. The value of some of the largest franchises, including the New York Yankees, Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs, increased last year and the 2023 revenue per team reached a record $378 million — though revenue sharing also reached a new record as there is a significant financial spread between the most valuable clubs and the least.
Individual player contracts also continued to shatter existing records, with Shohei Ohtani’s $700 million deal signed with the Dodgers before this season representing the largest total contract in sports history. The average MLB player salary grew in both 2023 and 2024, reaching a record $4.52 million for this season.
Though the attendance records being set in 2024 bode well for another record season in MLB, general and premium seating account for only 25% of the revenue that reached team owners last year. The revenue from local broadcasting rights is expected to fall between 20% and 30% over the next five years and growing ballpark revenue will become even more critical as a result.
In addition to the recent rule changes, MLB’s positive momentum can be credited to the fact that it is enjoying its first consistent seasons since the COVID-19 pandemic and lockouts disrupted both the 2020 and 2021 campaigns.
Further Change Ahead?
Manfred and MLB’s Joint Competition Committee would be hard pressed to quicken the pace of play even further, though they are sure to look at attendance and revenue records as signs that tweaking the rules can improve their product.
As they limited the pitch clock even further between 2023 and 2024, league officials faced significant criticism from players amid a sharp rise in season-ending injuries to pitchers.
“Despite unanimous player opposition and significant concerns regarding health and safety, the commissioner’s office reduced the length of the pitch clock last December, just one season removed from imposing the most significant rule change in decades,” players association executive director Tony Clark said in an early April statement, as franchise aces Shane Bieber and Spencer Strider joined a startling list of injured players. “Since then, our concerns about the health impacts of reduced recovery time have only intensified.”
But MLB is sure to continue streamlining the on-field product given the success it has seen and the pressure for continued revenue growth. For instance, the league plans to leverage an automated ball-strike system in all Triple-A games by the end of the month, indicating that it is moving toward implementation for the majors amid support from surveyed fans. It might further limit mound visits, widen base runners’ lanes, reduce blocking or make any number of other changes to the 148-year-old rules if fan interest and revenue growth might result.