Good Piece Sketching Out The Liberty-Braves Arrangement

M

MadduxFanII

Swallowed by Mark Bowman
We all love cursing Liberty Media (**** You Liberty Media!, for example), but it looks like the relationship between Liberty and our beloved Franchise Formerly Known As The Braves is a little more complicated than it looks. Here's a really good piece from Chris Jervis laying out the history of Liberty's acquisition and why our budget is the way it is.

Still wish they would sell, however.
 
MadduxFanII said:
We all love cursing Liberty Media (**** You Liberty Media!, for example), but it looks like the relationship between Liberty and our beloved Franchise Formerly Known As The Braves is a little more complicated than it looks. Here's a really good piece from Chris Jervis laying out the history of Liberty's acquisition and why our budget is the way it is.

Still wish they would sell, however.
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Forgot the link.
 
sturg33 said:
Interesting. So it seems the only way the Braves can raise payroll is if they first make a profit...
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Kind of. They were profitable last year. Now they're looking to sell stock to bring in cash to help subsidize them until they make a big push on season tickets for 2017. Then the complex will be profitable starting in 2017.
 
I know attendance is only part of the picture. But if it drops by 5,000 for 81 home games, that's a decline of 400,000. If the average revenue per attendee is say $40 we are talking a drop in revenues of 16 million. It isn't a trivial consideration when you trade away the players the fan base identify with. Of course winning trumps all, but winning is gonna be scarce for a few years.

The only way payroll is going to look like it is over 100M in 2016 is because we are counting money sent by the Indians and Angels in the trades we made with them.
 
The article explores the direct relationship with Liberty and how that effects payroll but doesn't deal with the payroll itself and how it is determined.

I know the Braves had a crippling local TV revenue deal leftover from Turner but has that expired?

I look at the Braves and they are the only game (MLB) in town in a Top 5 US media market plus are the essential de-facto home team for a number of other large regional media markets such as Charlotte, Raleigh Durham, Columbia, Nashville, Birmingham, Knoxville, etc. There is NO reason that they shouldn't be a large market team except for local media revenues and fan attendance. Fan attendance is directly related to the product put on the field and HAS been there in the past.
 
Attendance is tied to success and success is tied to the front office. Which is why I have and will continue to say the Braves aren't competing for anything with Hart around.
 
The national TV deal has bumped up revenues quite a bit in recent years. That affects all teams, and we have seen salaries increase significantly in recent years. The Braves have treaded water. Opening Day payroll has been in the 90-100M range each of the past five years, except for 2014 when it was pushed up by McGwirk's decision to approve an emergency expenditure for Santana. Why has our payroll stagnated at a time when it has gone up for other teams. Part of it is the local TV deal. But a significant part is attendance which is down 500,000 in 2015 from 2010. This has to a large extent negated the rise in national TV revenues, preventing payroll from growing as it has throughout the industry.

You can see from McGwirk's interview they are heavily counting on the halo effect of the new ballpark. It remains to be seen how long this halo effect lasts if the team is not winning games.
 
nsacpi said:
About 15M of that will be money chipped in by the Indians and Angels.
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When I look at the payroll I deduct that. So we have a 75M payroll now, not a 87.5M payroll. So I think we'll still spend another 25M-30M. This year's payroll was tabbed a year ago. Companies of this size don't look at their checking account before they go shopping. Everything is planned out a fiscal year ahead.
 
Chico said:
When I look at the payroll I deduct that. So we have a 75M payroll now, not a 87.5M payroll. So I think we'll still spend another 25M-30M. This year's payroll was tabbed a year ago. Companies of this size don't look at their checking account before they go shopping. Everything is planned out a fiscal year ahead.
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That's correct. And realistically they must be projecting another decline in attendance in 2016. They don't engage in wishful thinking when making those projections. Consequences for missing budget targets tend to be rather serious for organizations of this type.
 
nsacpi said:
That's correct. And realistically they must be projecting another decline in attendance in 2016. They don't engage in wishful thinking when making those projections. Consequences for missing budget targets tend to be rather serious for organizations of this type.
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I do think they're expecting a decrease in attendance, thus not caring about the backlash of trading Simmons. The new ballpark is going to open themselves up to more fans from the burbs, and more importantly more families. They will definitely see a huge spike in revenue once the complex opens that will bridge them to us winning.
 
NinersSBChamps said:
Attendance is tied to success and success is tied to the front office. Which is why I have and will continue to say the Braves aren't competing for anything with Hart around.
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Attendance and success have NEVER been tied together in Atlanta.

After the first few half of the run (1999), attendance drastically declined. Fans in Atlanta got spoined and quit coming to games because they EXPEXTED to go to the playoffs every year.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/ATL/attend.shtml

Try reading something other than things posted here before making such stupid statements.
 
nsacpi said:
The national TV deal has bumped up revenues quite a bit in recent years. That affects all teams, and we have seen salaries increase significantly in recent years. The Braves have treaded water. Opening Day payroll has been in the 90-100M range each of the past five years, except for 2014 when it was pushed up by McGwirk's decision to approve an emergency expenditure for Santana. Why has our payroll stagnated at a time when it has gone up for other teams. Part of it is the local TV deal. But a significant part is attendance which is down 500,000 in 2015 from 2010. This has to a large extent negated the rise in national TV revenues, preventing payroll from growing as it has throughout the industry.

You can see from McGwirk's interview they are heavily counting on the halo effect of the new ballpark. It remains to be seen how long this halo effect lasts if the team is not winning games.
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Which is exactly why they wanted to build the entire complex rather than just a new park. Revenues from leases for the restaurants, residential areas, etc. will help keep revenues more consistent - and substantially higher than they ever were at The Ted. The Braves will control where those revenues will be spent since Liberty doesn't meddle in the baseball decisions. This is why they intend to substantially raise payroll as the new park opens rather than now - the revenues will be in hand at that point.
 
clvclv said:
Attendance and success have NEVER been tied together in Atlanta.

After the first few half of the run (1999), attendance drastically declined. Fans in Atlanta got spoined and quit coming to games because they EXPEXTED to go to the playoffs every year.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/ATL/attend.shtml

Try reading something other than things posted here before making such stupid statements.
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24th in average attendance last season with an abysmal record. 18th in 2014 with a better record. 13th in 2013 with a team that made the post season.
 
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