Pro Yakyu not Losing to World Cup
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Re: Pro Yakyu not Losing to World Cup
[ Author: Guest: Gary Garland | Posted: Jun 9, 2002 7:11 PM
]
The attendance at Pro Yakyu games this season has indeed been good even with the World Cup (the Hanshin Tigers had another capacity crowd this weekend at Koshien, for example). However, if you want to talk TV ratings, the Cup has been blowing Pro Yakyu out of the water by a better than 2-1 margin. Mind you, it's not that Pro Yakyu TV ratings have been declining especially, just that the World Cup has drawn a huge tv audience in Japan.
However, the same thing cannot be said for Korea, where people are staying home in droves to watch World Cup matches while the pro baseball parks have gone extremely empty. In one case, according to the Korea Times, there was a game that drew just 684 fans due to the emphasis on the Cup matches in the media. Soccer has been a big sport in Korea for a while, though. When I was living there, I used to see a lot of kids playing sandlot soccer after school, but none playing baseball. So that may have something to do with it as well.
However, the same thing cannot be said for Korea, where people are staying home in droves to watch World Cup matches while the pro baseball parks have gone extremely empty. In one case, according to the Korea Times, there was a game that drew just 684 fans due to the emphasis on the Cup matches in the media. Soccer has been a big sport in Korea for a while, though. When I was living there, I used to see a lot of kids playing sandlot soccer after school, but none playing baseball. So that may have something to do with it as well.
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Yet, fans are turning out to Pro Yakyu nonetheless. 35,000 were at Chiba Marine to watch the Tigers vs. Swallows, 37,000 watched the Dragons host the BayStars at Nagoya Dome, and the usual 55,000 fans filled Tokyo Dome to watch the Giants drop one to Hiroshima.
The Pacific League did fairly well, although not quite as well as last weekend, with 15,000 at the smaller confines of Kanazawa Stadium for the Marines hosting the Hawks, and 19,000 fans turned out at both Seibu Dome and Osaka Dome to watch both home teams win (against the Fighters and BlueWave respectively) by dramatic one run margins. All three were day games. I watched the Buffaloes game on TV, and it seemed like a better turn out than that, but...
Nonetheless, due to the World Cup, the "powers that be" in Pro Yakyu decided to have a reduced schedule in June. Sure, the month, and Cup competition, has just started. But it looks to me like baseball is able to hold its own. Hey, with so many people from overseas coming to Japan for the World Cup, there's potential to make even more fans of baseball while their teams have days off or ticketless fans look for other ways to pass their time. Pro Yakyu should be looking at this as an opportunity, not backing away when presented with a little competition.