MAJORBLOGS.net - OPINION - 04.26.09 - The unthinkable has happened. Major League Baseball fans have actually said "Enough!" with the one voice that truly can put the fear of God into MLB Owners: Their wallets.

As the New York Times reported on the front page last week, the New York Yankees and the New York Mets, who both debuted new palatial stadiums in 2009 to the tune of some $2.3 Billion, had large bald patches in the priciest seating in the park because no one apparently wanted to pay the ante of $295 to $2,625 per seat. Yes, you do not need to blink, minor league fans anywhere in the saner parts of North America... That was $2,625 per seat. For one game.

Before all of you psychiatrists and psychologists from around the Midwest close up shop and move to New York City to treat a populace that has gone stark-raving bonkers, you will be pleased to know that even New Yorkers, who can sell Emperor-Without-Clothes "derivatives" on Wall Street and who booked loans at FDIC banks made to guys whose sole asset may be a three-card monte stand on 42nd Street, apparently still are not dumb enough to shell out that kind of jack for about 5,000 of the supposed-best seats in professional baseball.

The gaping holes behind home plate and in other pricier sections of these parks often consumed by a status-concious corporate America are visual testimony that the Cash Ceiling may have been reached by MLB.

The new corporate America that will rise up from the ashes of the 2008 Banking Scandals will be much more monitored, and more circumspect in its spending.

Junkets and perqs that would go unnoticed as the cost of doing business in past years are going to come under increased scrutiny by management and corporate boards who are being poked by angry and more vocal shareholders.

As President Obama sets the tone for more corporate thrift and accountability, it may be very hard to sell $2,000+ seats with a straight face, even in anything-goes NYC.

Some minor league entrepreneur without great fear of Bud Light, the MLB Commissioner, or MiLB Prez Pat O'Conner, should probably offer prospective Yankee top-ticket holders a complete weekend package of round-trip transportation, hotel, the game, and a top-line dinner the night or day before the game for less than it costs to park your butt in the Bronx.

The Yankees' dismal opening weekend added an extra measure of insult to the injury of paying obscene prices to enjoy the former National Pastime.

Where do fans who cannot afford $295 a seat go to watch baseball? Apparently they head for their living rooms.

The roll-out of the new MLB Network is designed to lighten the pockets of MLB-crazy fans who cannot afford the gate at the stadium, as well as those outside of the 30 cities of the Empire who want to see their team's home games without television blackouts, and to pick up the away games.

It costs an average of $200.00 a year for the privilege of not going to live baseball, and being shackled to your television set.

According to a recent article in Media Life, 50 million people gave MLB and its cable and satelitte partners nearly $10 Billion for that privilege. That is enough to keep A-Rod in mink-lined bat cases, at least, for a while.

Yet there are disturbing indications that this money may be short-lived, a remnant echo of the post WWII Greatest Generation and their children, the Baby Boomers. These increasingly elderly people still make up the heavy core of baseball's audience.

"Baseball's graying," Minor league owner Mike Veeck, whose father Bill owned the Cleveland Indians, Chicago White Sox, and St. Louis Browns told Bnet's Patrick Hruby. "In case anybody hasn't noticed, baseball is not the top priority for an 11-, 12,13-, 14-year-old boy or girl. We're not growing new fans."

"More than half of baseball's viewers are at least 50 years old" agrees Mark Conrad in his book The Business of Sports: A Primer for Journalists.

In a Scarborough Sports Marketing poll conducted over 2007 and published in April of last year. only 12% of 18-24 year-olds and 17% of 25-34 year-olds were fans of MLB.

What should be equally disturbing is that, in the "core" audience of 35-54 year-olds, those who have both the most means and the most interest in the game, only 35-36% identify themselves as the kind of fans who are apt to go out of their way to watch a baseball game.

Kadence Buchanan notes in an article in Ezine Articles: "More families are opting out of the great American pastime of attending major league baseball games than ever before. Some are staying home and watching the games on television, but growing numbers of families are flocking to minor league ballparks."

Over the last decade, cost has been the factor most killing MLB, and pumping up minor league baseball.

"Although many explanations have been offered by Major League Baseball including changing demographics and competition from other sports and entertainment venues, cost is an undeniable factor in lagging attendance," Ms. Buchanan writes. "The average cost for a family of four to attend a major league baseball game in 2005 topped $170.00 for tickets, refreshments and souvenirs but not including parking. The cost for that same family to attend a minor league baseball game in 2005 was $80.00, less than half the cost of attending a major league game."

Even amongst the older viewers though, who are conditioned to watch baseball on television, the current economy makes the $200.00 TV package pricey.

"I love baseball," confided Michael Hurlihan, a 68-year-old retired Floridian who operated a souvenier stand at one of the Grapefruit League parks this spring, "That's why I work here. I can't afford t'watch those games on the television anymore like we used to. I guess I'll have to watch whatever comes up on the free TV."

Meanwhile, $200.00 would buy Mr. Hurlihan nine or ten games sitting in seats close to the field watching the game of baseball as has been played through the ages.

The model that MLB operates on is unsustainable not just financially but demographically. The audience which they are seeking has rapidly shifted away from their primary points of operation and returning to the 1970s model of television as a primary source of revenue is not the solution to their problems, as it will die off with that television audience.

Baseball is at its best where it is played and then watched live. Consider the great stories of most players and chroniclers of the sport who recount their days playing stickball in the streets of the major metropolises of the Industrial Age. Kids and parents would scrape together a little bit to go and yell and scream at the palaces of baseball, which, for a modest fee, provided a whole lot of entertainment.

The teams and leagues of MiLB, Minor League Baseball, are the only professional baseball clubs following that model, and the only baseball clubs whose audience share is steadily increasing, particularly in the key 18-24 demographic.

"Millions of fans are turning Minor-league baseball into one of the biggest spectator sports in North America," noted a USA Today article. Aside from premium seating, minor league baseball players aren't seen as the spoiled, the drug-hyped or the overpaid. MiLB's audience has grown steadily by more than 10 million over the last ten years.

MLB's answer to this was to strong-arm the MiLB network on the Internet into their own this fall, and to try and sell more television packages via the network to lure away minor league fans from their live game.

These are not 1970s fans though. Young people with lots of alternatives and Gameboy-amped perceptions of the world are not going to sit and watch baseball on television. They are not going to root for a Sabremetrically controlled, sanitized-for-the-player's protection 150-pitch count snoozefest.

Baseball used to be exciting. The complete games of a Sandy Koufax, hurt but still pitching into the 8th, or the ferocious base stealing of a Ty Cobb brought people to their feet. Today's players are in great condition, but their overall play still cannot hold a candle to guys whose daily regimen between ballgames largely consisted of drinking and gambling.

Minor league baseball is exciting. Players steal home. Pitchers pitch complete games to learn how to do it. The parks are also better built for the total entertainment experience. There are things for the kids to do if they're bored. There are places to hang out where young people can meet without being forced to stay in their seats. There are the grassy berms that bring back the much simpler days of coming to a park and watching the game. The parks and their players in them are accessible and fan-friendly.

MLB is as hide-bound as General Motors. Their future is equally bleak. The numbers of fans coming along do not support the idea that anything that the Selig-led era has done has materially changed a future devoid of baseball fans after the Baby Boomers pass their prime spending years.

Fantasy baseball was once thought to be the province of guys sitting around kitchen tables.

Today it is clear that most of it is played around the offices of Major League Baseball.