Analyzing 2021 Minor League Attendance Trends

In any other year, the attendance trends in 2021 would be greeted with concern and dismay.

For the 120 full-season Minor League Baseball teams, attendance was down nearly 1,000 fans per game per team. The 120 full-season MiLB clubs averaged 4,201 fans per game per team in 2019 and 3,234 fans per game per team in 2021 (a 23% drop).

But as you all know, this is not any other year. This is the year that the minors returned to action after losing the entirety of the 2020 season to the coronavirus pandemic. The season was shortened to 120 games for both Class A levels and Double-A and 130 games for the Triple-A level. Some teams dealt with capacity restrictions early in the season. Others faced reluctance from some fans (especially groups) to attend games all year because of the ongoing pandemic. And all teams faced a shortened selling season because of the delays in getting a 2021 MiLB schedule announced.

Those complicating factors didn’t affect all teams equally, but it did affect everyone in some manner. Only three MiLB teams drew more fans per game in 2021 than they did in 2019, and one of those three was a team that stopped selling tickets for three out of every six home games.

 

In talking to a number of people around the minors, the overall sense at the end of the 2021 season is one of relief much more than panic. While there were sporadic game cancellations because of players and staff testing positive for Covid-19, those cancellations were not widespread. While teams had hurdles when it came to selling tickets, fans did return to the ballpark.

And with almost all ticket and advertising make-goods from the canceled 2020 season now off the books and the 2022 schedules being announced, teams can head into next season with the expectation of the first “normal” offseason since 2019.

The reduction of the minor leagues to 120 full-season clubs means that the mark for what was considered an excellent attendance season in the past is now obsolete. MLB’s takeover of the minors eliminated 40 teams from the affiliated minors. It also means that the Mexican League, which MiLB was affiliated with and counted in its attendance marks, no longer counts in the attendance figures.

That means that it is likely that the 43.26 million fans MiLB drew in attendance in 2008 will stand as the all-time record for the foreseeable future. MiLB drew 42.4 million in 2014 and 42.5 million in 2015, but MiLB has failed to top 42 million since. In 2019, the final year of the old format, MiLB drew 41.5 million fans, for an average of 4,044 fans per game per team.

This year, that number dipped to 22.1 million fans in attendance. Comparing like to like, the 120 full-season MiLB teams in 2019 drew 33.3 million fans, but that was in a season with 1,114 additional home dates because of the longer season.

With some coronavirus cancellations this year, the overall percentage of lost dates for all causes rose, but not dramatically. In 2018, 5.4% of scheduled dates were lost. In 2019, teams lost 5.2% of scheduled dates. In 2021, that number rose to 5.9%.

The 11-million drop in fans is precipitous, but it’s impossible to treat this season as close to normal. And the MiLB drop in attendance was actually significantly less as a percentage than the drop at the MLB level.

Major League Baseball played a full 162-game schedule. But it was affected by the coronavirus pandemic as well—Toronto had to relocate to Dunedin and Buffalo for a significant chunk of the season, and some teams had capacity restrictions at points during the season.

MLB saw its attendance drop from 68.5 million fans in 2019 to 45.3 million fans in 2021. Average attendance dipped from 28,339 fans per game to 18,909 this year (a 33% drop). Three MLB teams (Rays, A’s and Marlins) failed to top 10,000 fans per home game in 2021. The last MLB team to fail to top 10,000 fans in average attendance were the 2004 Montreal Expos.They drew 9,357 fans per home game in 2004—their final season in Montreal.

From July 1 until the end of the season, MiLB teams averaged 3,551 (an increase of more than 300 fans per game) and MLB teams averaged 23,475 fans per game (an increase of 5,000 fans per game). While attendance does normally go up as summer arrives, it’s also an indicator of how the capacity limitations of the first half of the season affected overall attendance.

In another year, such an attendance dip could be viewed as a sign that MiLB and MLB have to figure out better ways to engage fans. But in 2021, the pandemic makes this a year unlike any other, and one where trying to infer anything from attendance trends is foolhardy.