The New York Yankees president Randy Levine finds himself not only disheartened by his team’s absence from the playoffs for the first time since 2016 and their poorest record since 1992 but also by the lack of progress he’s observed from the teams in Florida.
Challenges in MLB
During a panel at Sportico’s “Invest in Sports” conference on Wednesday, Randy Levine discussed the challenges faced by smaller-market teams, sharing the stage with Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner.
“Although, I think that a lot more focus has to be on individual teams to do better and not rely on revenue sharing,” Levine said in a clip posted by Sportico’s editor-in-chief. “You can’t have two Florida teams averaging 15,000 fans. You can’t have it. You don’t go into an NFL stadium or NBA arena and see that.”
Reevaluating revenue sharing
Levine suggested in a clip posted by Sportico’s editor-in-chief that there should be a greater emphasis on individual teams improving themselves rather than depending on revenue sharing. He pointed out that having two Florida teams with an average of 15,000 fans is not acceptable, emphasizing that such attendance figures are not seen in NFL or NBA venues.
Levine’s perspective is accurate when considering the low attendance figures for the Marlins, who averaged 14,356 fans at loanDepot Park, and the Rays, who averaged 17,781 fans at Tropicana Field. This ongoing trend places these teams at the bottom of MLB in terms of home attendance. It’s worth noting that Levine could have also mentioned the Oakland A’s, who averaged 10,276 fans; however, they are currently in the process of relocating to Las Vegas.
The Rays gained notoriety for unfavorable reasons during the AL wild-card opener. They had the smallest playoff game attendance since 1919 (excluding the COVID-19 season), as reported by the Elias Sports Bureau, with just 19,704 fans present. This figure was approximately 5,300 below Tropicana Field’s full capacity. To put it into perspective, as highlighted by Sports Illustrated, the total attendance for the first two games at Tropicana Field was even less than the attendance at the opening games in Philadelphia and Milwaukee.
The Marlins suffered losses in both games in Philadelphia and were unable to host a playoff game at their home stadium.
Revenue sharing, where 48% of the earnings are collectively distributed among the 30 teams, has been a contentious issue in MLB. Its purpose is to allocate funds to smaller-market teams, with the expectation that they will use it to enhance their competitiveness and invest in players. However, rather than investing in players and improving their teams, many owners are retaining the money for themselves.
What do you think? Leave a comment below.
HEY LEVINE…UR A LACK OF PROGRESS !!!.
U AND CROSS-EYED CASHMAN BOTH LACK ON DOING UR JOB !!!. U BOTH ARE A ” P.O.S”!!!
NOW… U REALIZE THE PROBLEMS “THE YANKEE EMPIRE” IS DEALING WITH !!!.
WHERE THE FUCK HAVE U BEEN …RANDY !!!
UR A FUCKIN JOKE !!!. 🤣 🤣 🤣 .
ENOUGH SAID 😡 !!!.
GOD BLESS AMERICA 🙏 !!!.
Absolutely agree. Levine is a dinosaur that only cares about pushing the brand. Not interested in winning. Needs to be fired along with Cashman.
He is a joke. Needs to worry about fixing the Yankees instead is blowing his mouth about other teams. He is one of the big reasons Yankees are such an embarrassment
First of all, when baseball was expanding years ago, they didn’t look to the future, and plan for some of the teams struggling with attendance—secondly, baseball is greedy, and are pricing out a large segment of their fans, who can’t afford to go see a game—they are even going after the TV audience now, by taking games away from them, and making them buy sites like Prime—the game is killing itself—people can’t or wont pay for extra channels—more kids play soccer than little league baseball—the Field of Dreams has become the field of nightmares