Braves on verge of acquiring interim OF

DirkPiggler said:
If the Braves are counting on attendance of 3 million plus to get the payroll to an acceptable level, then we're screwed regardless of what happens on the field. With the smaller capacity, to draw 3 million fans they'll have to average selling 90% of the tickets for every game. They had a hard time doing that when the Braves were winning division titles every year.

Reducing capacity only makes sense if each seat removed reduces variable costs (highly unlikely - fixed costs are the main problem), or if it involves replacing regular seats with suites or other premium, high-revenue areas. And if the latter is the chosen path, then the team should take that into account for annual budgeting purposes. If they're not, and if they're using below-expected attendance as an excuse to keep payroll down, they're being disingenuous.

Either way, barring a surprise last minute deal, you were dead-on in calling this scenario, when many others including myself believed (or at least hoped) that the team would somehow find a pot o' gold somewhere in the retail development that would save the day.
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Starting in 2002, the Braves have pretty consistently drawn between 2.4M and 2.6M fans per year. Over the same timeframe, they have also consistently had an opening day payroll that stayed below $100M. The one exception was 2014 when they were able to spend an extra $14M on Ervin Santana due to injuries, which brought their payroll to a record $112M.

During the rebuild the opening day payroll dipped below $90M because attendance dipped down to 2M.

When they opened Suntrust they almost certainly projected attendance to be well over their 2.4M-2.6M range at Turner, and set a new opening day payroll record of ~$125M. They enjoyed a sell out streak to open the park that lasted 2 whole days. They had 24k people attend the 4th game of the shiny new park. It was apparent very early on that they would miss revenue projections. This was the first red flag for me.

When Freeman got hurt, they signed some scrap heap 1b to replace him (Loney?). They only traded for MAdams after getting permission to add his meager $2M salary. Needing special permission to add such a cheap player was the second red flag for me.

At the trade deadline the Braves salary dumped Garcia, Phillips and SRod. SRod was rushed back for one reason: to showcase him for a salary dump. SRod is exactly the type of stopgap 3b the Braves are looking for now, yet they dumped him anyways. They even went so far as to play the “Freeman to 3b” game in a desperate attempt to gain leverage in a MAdams salary dump trade. That was the third red flag to me.

Logically connecting these facts:

1. Attendance of 2.4M-2.6M at Turner allowed for a payroll under $100M.

2. Revenue on a per person basis should be higher at Suntrust.

3. The $125M opening day payroll was deemed too high when it became obvious attendance would struggle to hit 2.5M in 2018.

4. It is reasonable to predict, at best, equal attendance in 2019, and probably less.

Therefore, if $125M was too high at 2.5M in attendance, and attendance will either decrease or stay flat, opening day payroll must decrease.

That’s where I got my $110M-$115M value, and folks argued endlessly about it because they refused to think logically. Hell, I won money for my favorite charity in a bet with Ivan at TC because of it.
 
Enscheff said:
Starting in 2002, the Braves have pretty consistently drawn between 2.4M and 2.6M fans per year. Over the same timeframe, they have also consistently had an opening day payroll that stayed below $100M. The one exception was 2014 when they were able to spend an extra $14M on Ervin Santana due to injuries, which brought their payroll to a record $112M.

During the rebuild the opening day payroll dipped below $90M because attendance dipped down to 2M.

When they opened Suntrust they almost certainly projected attendance to be well over their 2.4M-2.6M range at Turner, and set a new opening day payroll record of ~$125M. They enjoyed a sell out streak to open the park that lasted 2 whole days. They had 24k people attend the 4th game of the shiny new park. It was apparent very early on that they would miss revenue projections. This was the first red flag for me.

When Freeman got hurt, they signed some scrap heap 1b to replace him (Loney?). They only traded for MAdams after getting permission to add his meager $2M salary. Needing special permission to add such a cheap player was the second red flag for me.

At the trade deadline the Braves salary dumped Garcia, Phillips and SRod. SRod was rushed back for one reason: to showcase him for a salary dump. SRod is exactly the type of stopgap 3b the Braves are looking for now, yet they dumped him anyways. They even went so far as to play the “Freeman to 3b” game in a desperate attempt to gain leverage in a MAdams salary dump trade. That was the third red flag to me.

Logically connecting these facts:

1. Attendance of 2.4M-2.6M at Turner allowed for a payroll under $100M.
2. Revenue on a per person basis should be higher at Suntrust.
3. The $125M opening day payroll was deemed too high when it became obvious attendance would struggle to hit 2.5M in 2018.
4. It is reasonable to predict, at best, equal attendance in 2019, and probably less.

Therefore, if $125M was too high at 2.5M in attendance, and attendance will either decrease or stay flat, opening day payroll must decrease.

That’s where I got my $110M-$115M value, and folks argued endlessly about it because they refused to think logically. Hell, I won money for my favorite charity in a bet with Ivan at TC because of it.
Click to expand...

The thing is, it's about what Liberty wants (and is allowed) to do. When they bought the Braves, the team was generally top 10 in baseball payroll and often top five. MLB approved the sale after assurances that they wouldn't be turned into the tax write off that they are today. Somewhere along the way, Liberty was allowed or decided to do as they wish.

Sure Ted did the team no favors with the incredibly bad local TV deal he left them with. However, MLB revenue sharing has taken an exponential turn over the last 10 years. The money is there. It just isn't being spent by Liberty. And they are very good business people. Unfortunately, their investment dollar makes them more money elsewhere as they sit back and let the rest of MLB drag their franchise value higher and higher.

I understand what is happening in Florida. You have new ownership with a large capital outlay coming in looking to recoup as much of their investment as fast as they can. Their National and local TV money are likely enough to pay all bills without consideration of all other revenue streams. Both Miami fans are outraged, but why should the new owners care?

But for the Braves...I wish Liberty would look at how George Steinbrenner built the Yankees into one of the top 2-3 most valuable franchises in the world.
 
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Enscheff said:
Starting in 2002, the Braves have pretty consistently drawn between 2.4M and 2.6M fans per year. Over the same timeframe, they have also consistently had an opening day payroll that stayed below $100M. The one exception was 2014 when they were able to spend an extra $14M on Ervin Santana due to injuries, which brought their payroll to a record $112M.

During the rebuild the opening day payroll dipped below $90M because attendance dipped down to 2M.

When they opened Suntrust they almost certainly projected attendance to be well over their 2.4M-2.6M range at Turner, and set a new opening day payroll record of ~$125M. They enjoyed a sell out streak to open the park that lasted 2 whole days. They had 24k people attend the 4th game of the shiny new park. It was apparent very early on that they would miss revenue projections. This was the first red flag for me.

When Freeman got hurt, they signed some scrap heap 1b to replace him (Loney?). They only traded for MAdams after getting permission to add his meager $2M salary. Needing special permission to add such a cheap player was the second red flag for me.

At the trade deadline the Braves salary dumped Garcia, Phillips and SRod. SRod was rushed back for one reason: to showcase him for a salary dump. SRod is exactly the type of stopgap 3b the Braves are looking for now, yet they dumped him anyways. They even went so far as to play the “Freeman to 3b” game in a desperate attempt to gain leverage in a MAdams salary dump trade. That was the third red flag to me.

Logically connecting these facts:

1. Attendance of 2.4M-2.6M at Turner allowed for a payroll under $100M.
2. Revenue on a per person basis should be higher at Suntrust.
3. The $125M opening day payroll was deemed too high when it became obvious attendance would struggle to hit 2.5M in 2018.
4. It is reasonable to predict, at best, equal attendance in 2019, and probably less.

Therefore, if $125M was too high at 2.5M in attendance, and attendance will either decrease or stay flat, opening day payroll must decrease.

That’s where I got my $110M-$115M value, and folks argued endlessly about it because they refused to think logically. Hell, I won money for my favorite charity in a bet with Ivan at TC because of it.
Click to expand...

This was really well done. It's likely that fewer people would have disagreed with you about payroll if you had originally spelled out your reasoning in this manner. I think you may be reading too much into the Freeman at third experiment, but I have a tough time disputing any of your other logic.
 
DirkPiggler said:
If the Braves are counting on attendance of 3 million plus to get the payroll to an acceptable level, then we're screwed regardless of what happens on the field. With the smaller capacity, to draw 3 million fans they'll have to average selling 90% of the tickets for every game. They had a hard time doing that when the Braves were winning division titles every year.

Reducing capacity only makes sense if each seat removed reduces variable costs (highly unlikely - fixed costs are the main problem), or if it involves replacing regular seats with suites or other premium, high-revenue areas. And if the latter is the chosen path, then the team should take that into account for annual budgeting purposes. If they're not, and if they're using below-expected attendance as an excuse to keep payroll down, they're being disingenuous.

Either way, barring a surprise last minute deal, you were dead-on in calling this scenario, when many others including myself believed (or at least hoped) that the team would somehow find a pot o' gold somewhere in the retail development that would save the day.
Click to expand...

They have fewer seats but each seat creates more revenue.
 
Southcack77 said:
They have fewer seats but each seat creates more revenue.
Click to expand...

This is true. However, if this is the case, then Liberty should not use the same attendance figures as they did at Turner Field to determine payroll. Part of the sales pitch (to the fan base) from moving to Cobb County was that the team would have additional revenue from premium seating and from the real estate development that could go towards fielding a more competitive roster through increased payroll.
 
DirkPiggler said:
This is true. However, if this is the case, then Liberty should not use the same attendance figures as they did at Turner Field to determine payroll. Part of the sales pitch (to the fan base) from moving to Cobb County was that the team would have additional revenue from premium seating and from the real estate development that could go towards fielding a more competitive roster through increased payroll.
Click to expand...

The Braves had a $125M opening day payroll with 2.5M in attendance at Suntrust. They are about to have a $106M-$114M payroll while likely projecting less than 2.5M in attendance for 2018.

In Turner, 2.5M in attendance got the team a payroll under $100M, usually well under $100M.

They are clearly spending more money on payroll per ticket sold in Suntrust.

This criticism that they aren’t spending enough relative to revenues is silly.
 
DirkPiggler said:
This is true. However, if this is the case, then Liberty should not use the same attendance figures as they did at Turner Field to determine payroll. Part of the sales pitch (to the fan base) from moving to Cobb County was that the team would have additional revenue from premium seating and from the real estate development that could go towards fielding a more competitive roster through increased payroll.
Click to expand...

We don't know how Liberty determines payroll. They had kept it fairly consistent in prior seasons before bumping it up with the move. I think you can fairly say the bump would have been related to their estimate increase of profits at the new park. It's entirely possible that 125 million was a conservative projection by a Media Company whose primary concern isn't winning championships and that future payrolls will continue to remain in that range regardless of the actual profits.

We don't really have a very good sense of the rules between Liberty and the Braves and we don't have a total picture of their business. But we do know that Liberty reported, under SEC regulations, that the Braves increased their profits 70% through the 3Q of 2017 over the same period in 2016. That would include the increase in payroll and any one time expenses associated with the transition to Suntrust and not include any additional revenues that would be generated by building out the rest of the Battery.

So you are right. It's entirely possible that Liberty is not passing along the entire benefit of increased profits to the baseball club.

But we don't know.
 
Enscheff said:
The Braves had a $125M opening day payroll with 2.5M in attendance at Suntrust. They are about to have a $106M-$114M payroll while likely projecting less than 2.5M in attendance for 2018.

In Turner, 2.5M in attendance got the team a payroll under $100M, usually well under $100M.

They are clearly spending more money on payroll per ticket sold in Suntrust.

This criticism that they aren’t spending enough relative to revenues is silly.
Click to expand...

Hence my use of the term “if”.
 
I am not posting this to be argumentative, but just asking relative to these well-reasoned points:

Relative to the attendance dropping in 2018, is there no buzz generated by Albies and Acuna (whenever) to bring out fans, considering that it was discovered that access is not nearly as difficult as was feared and that construction is that much farther along relative towards other attractions. Certainly the area around the stadium was a work in progress last year.
 
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