Dear Mr Balfour,

I am writing in response to your recent letter to members of the Sydney Blue Sox.

First and foremost, well done on being so proactive in your communication. Fans enjoy being consulted (even if we are simultaneously being harangued) and I applaud any sporting administrator who makes a habit of creating open dialogue with the public.

Within this passionate piece of communication, you implored fans to show up for games and help to establish the future of the league and sport in this country.

I love baseball. I love it to bits.

Unlike yourself, I have never progressed out of the Sunday scrub leagues but have been a fiercely passionate follower for many years and was thrilled to hear of an Australian league backed by none other than Major League Baseball.

Sadly, I don’t believe the ABL as a whole has seized upon the impetus of an enthusiastic local baseball community, nor the vast resources of its American counterpart. As such, the sport finds itself at somewhat of a crossroad and struggling to find its true identity and niche within the crowded Australian sporting market.

While I am not a member of the Blue Sox, I read your letter via a tweet and decided to put some thoughts together on how the ABL and MLB can work together to create a dynamic and engaging baseball community right here in our own backyard.

I’m a Melbourne Aces fan, but my interest can best be described as casual. Of course I hope they prevail on any given game day, but I feel nothing after a loss. I presume this speaks for most fans of the club who have no personal connection to the players, which is a big problem.

It goes against everything about traditional sporting culture.

You want to ride the elation that comes with victory and feel a burning sense of pain or determination when the ledger doesn’t go your way.

I dare say that most ABL fans – both casual and diehard – have MLB allegiances that are much more passionate than their Australian links. It’s not fair to compare the two entities, but it’s something to keep in mind when moving forward. We must find a way to drive passion.

We must engage and empower our fans. Make them feel a part of the team. Take them on the ride with you. As it stands, there are too many people (including myself) who have a passing interest but don’t make it to many games for whatever reason.

Why?

People are time poor. If you have four spare hours on a Saturday will you be off to the golf course, a family event or an ABL match? Why do you think cricket has bastardised the sport beyond recognition? Because fans no longer have the time to attend for hours on end. I’m not for one second suggesting this is the answer; rather merely pointing out that the league and clubs should temper expectations as to physical attendance.

Every other sport you care to watch in our fine country contains the best athletes in the world in that particular endeavour – and I say that with all due respect to the Australian baseball community. Go to watch the AFL, cricket, NRL, Super Rugby and Australian Open – you will see the world’s best players competing. Perhaps the notable exceptions are basketball and ice hockey – both American sports by origin – and they are going through similar woes in terms of attendance, sponsorship and broadcast.

I don’t believe there is any ‘fix’ to this issue but again, it serves as a stark reminder about why it’s so difficult for lower tier sports to gain cut-through in the busy local landscape.

You spoke of your disappointment of recent crowd figures when entertaining sponsors and the New South Wales Minister for Sport.

Did the Blue Sox and/or the ABL have an engagement strategy around these fixtures?

Promote a giveaway night in the weeks leading up, make bobbleheads, heck… throw the gates open free of charge. Guarantee bums on seats when you are entertaining VIPs. Sure – it’s not a sustainable long term plan, but these groups will be left with a perception that baseball has a burgeoning fan base and the sport won’t be left with egg on its face.

I’ll raise my hand and say that I’ve only been to a handful of Aces games since inception despite my passion for the sport and living just a few blocks from the Melbourne Showgrounds. The main reasons I have seldom been are outlined above; 1) lack of time and 2) lack of personal connection to the club and players.

I would much rather sit on my couch at home and stream a Los Angeles Dodgers game than ride five minutes down the road to see the Aces play on a Saturday afternoon. That’s an incredibly sad state of affairs, but I honestly believe it reflects the attitude of many fans (and potential fans) throughout Australia.

The ABL needs to create more dynamic and authentic environments in which to play and watch baseball. It doesn’t help that our local venue doubles as an agricultural paddock, but it’s the best we have.

In my limited trips to the ballpark I have been frustrated by;

1)    The utterly abhorrent selection of food and;
2)    The exorbitant price of beer and small bar area in which you can drink it.

Isn’t part of baseball culture buying a couple of beers in the sun to enjoy from your bleacher seat? The last thing fans want is to be herded into a bar where you can barely see the game as you pay $8 for a bottle of beer or $6 for a can of local draught depending on the venue.

I understand these factors are probably dictated by licensing laws and the like but again, it’s a contributing factor to why people aren’t showing up for games (at least here in Melbourne – I can’t speak for other venues).

If you want a snack or a ‘meal’ at an ABL game, good luck! Where is the caramel popcorn? The nachos dripping with guacamole and jalapenos? The hot dogs with a million choices of sides rather than “sauce or mustard” that we have here? Baseball is a sport built around food! The fan experience at stadiums is heavily dependent on what you can get to eat and drink while you’re sitting there for three hours watching a game unfold. If I can’t drink a beer in my seat or find anything other than a soggy dim sim and something that once resembled a corn dog, forget it.

I was in the States several months ago and was fortunate enough to attend the World Series. I’m not going to sit here comparing the amenities of the Melbourne Showgrounds with Busch Stadium, but I might as well have been on another planet. It’s as if Australian venues and vendors have never watched or attended the game in the USA before. The cultural divide is vast and it results in a significantly diminished fan experience.

Just one of the many ballpark culinary
delights you will find in the USA.

Finally, I’d like to discuss the sport in the media.

For baseball to increase its audience, it needs to be visible throughout all sectors of the industry. The ABL and clubs have done a fair job trying to use Twitter and Facebook – but mainly because it’s inexpensive and relatively easy to manage once you are up and running. Sadly, this medium is largely preaching to the converted and can give the illusion that it’s hitting the mark.

One regular season ABL game needs to be broadcast via Fox Sports or ONE HD every week. This is understandably a complicated and expensive exercise, but with the right sales pitch to big brother in the United States, I’m certain the ABL could broker a deal with Australia’s preeminent sports broadcasters to showcase our sport.

It’s great to see the All-Star Game going out live this week and I admit that it’s a start to attracting the fence-sitters, but the bread and butter of the sport should be the priority over a once-a-year novelty hit around.

Some clubs live stream certain games but it’s not uniform throughout the league. Why is this? Is it a question of resources, or is it the prerogative of each ballclub rather than a league-driven directive?

In this day and age, live streaming is a must. If the sport can’t get itself on TV it should be broadcasting every single match online. I applaud the clubs that have moved in this direction but will politely add the quality is ordinary at best. I acknowledge there are many factors at play, but the ABL should be taking this project by the scruff of the neck and ensuring that local Australian baseball can be beamed LIVE into living rooms, iPads and bars throughout the world. It’s too important to not get right and with the backing of the MLB, I honestly can’t see why this hasn’t been implemented to the extent that it could be.

The MLB is widely acknowledged as having the best digital, social and conventional media strategy in world sport. No other league can compete with the way Bud Selig’s team has presented the sport to diehard and new-coming fans. That is why I was so optimistic to hear that the ABL was a partner to the MLB, but there are very few visible links that would give anyone the impression that these two sporting bodies were in partnership.

The ABL needs to lean on this resource. It needs to get the MLB’s best digital staff to come and visit in the off-season to draw up strategic plans. It needs to find ways to leverage sponsorship and deliver baseball to as many Australian homes as possible. At present, the league seems to be relying on a traditional marketing strategy and hoping people show up to games. In this day and age, this is not going to be effective and the sport will stagnate.

If anything, the digital space can be vastly more beneficial than packed stadiums. We’d all love to see the bums on seats, but I contend that a potential investor would be much more interested in plunging capital into the sport if they saw a high quality streaming platform with integrated social media feeds and sponsorship opportunities.

Far too often ‘success’ is dictated by attendance (which incidentally is quite regularly embellished by a number of sports and venues). Would you rather have 500 at the stadium and zero watching at home or 200 at the stadium and 1000 watching at home at some point throughout the game?

The first Big Bash League match in Melbourne attracted some 20k people less than what was anticipated. Sure, this was a blow for administrators but their frustration was quickly turned to optimism when they heard it had smashed all previous Australian pay-TV records.

It goes to show that you can have a commercially successful product without necessarily filling the stadium.

An online broadcast adds flexibility. It allows you to drift in and out of the game, fit baseball into your busy daily schedule or watch a replay later when you have more time. This is ultimately what society is demanding and it’s what sport should be catering to.

But I digress. I’ve strayed from the initial premise of your letter – which was imploring your members to show up – but everything I’ve raised above is intrinsically linked to your goal and the future of baseball in Australia.

I greatly respect your passion Mr Balfour, but I think fans desperately need alternate means of consuming baseball rather than a stern (yet heartfelt) diatribe from their General Manager. I agree that people should turn up whenever their schedule permits, but the fan experience – as it currently stands – is not conducive to enhancing this facet of the sport.

We can’t expect the ABL to be perfect off the bat. Like any burgeoning league, it needs time, sound management and true belief and passion from those working within. I can only hope those wheels are churning, but there is a lot that needs to happen at all levels before this league can expect any significant growth – and I truly hope to see it happen.

Yours in baseball,

Alistair Hogg