Our Too Early Pitch Clock Check In

It is probably way too early, but we thought we would look at average game attendance and where it stands compared to the prior year, since this is the year of the pitch clock.  We are at about half way through the season, and per Baseball-Reference.com (as of July 3rd) baseball has currently drawn about 2.8 million more fans than the prior year (35.3M vs 32.5).

If you just want to chalk up this increase to the pitch clock then that is a lot to attribute to a decreased game time of 26 minutes.  That is currently the decrease from last year’s average game time of 3:06 to this year’s, which clocks in at 2:40.

As we noted, the powers that be in baseball, probably are already pointing to the rule changes and most notably the implementation of the pitch clock as the reason for the attendance increases.  Keep in mind though that due to the coronavirus baseball was essentially closed for business in 2020, and 2021 was not much better.  By 2022, things certainly lifted in terms of the pandemic, but it was far from over and for the most vulnerable of fans, going to a crowded ballpark and exposing themselves to possible infection was not an option.  Therefore, if MLB had done nothing this year (not changed one rule) the attendance numbers would surely have gone up as we noted in our prior post, but we guarantee that this will not stop them from taking a victor lap at year-end and proclaim that the new rules saved the sport.

We will keep monitoring the attendance figures throughout the season and will periodically post on them, but we here at BP already concede that the attendance figures will in the end be up over the past year, as also noted in our prior link above.  The question for everyone is this due to the new rule changes or the lifting of the pandemic?  Only time will ultimately answer this question.