Through June 1, home attendance at Dodger Stadium is down a total of 221,984 from last season, an average 7,161 fewer fans per game. This represents a 16.7 percent overall drop, which is by far the worst in baseball this season.

Attendance across MLB through Monday is down 381,786 from last season, an average of 426 fewer fans per game

The Dodgers organization continues to decline to discuss season ticket sales or overall attendance but it’s clear that the Dodgers are battling a double whammy of far fewer walk-up and single game advance ticket sales as well as a significant no-show rate that is plaguing baseball as a whole.

If you haven’t read Darren Rovell’s story entitled Does Major League Baseball Have an Attendance Problem then head over to CNBC right now and take a look (or watch the embedded video below). the number of people tweeting pictures with hashtags #emptystadium or #emptystadiums showing the disparity between reported attendance and actual butts-in-seats is surprising.

The Dodgers were only selling tickets to this Yankees series if consumers also bought a ticket plan of some sort.  This means that the average Dodger fan who can’t afford to go to a bunch of Dodger games could theoretically be priced out of the Yankee series altogether.  In theory, the people that could then afford the higher ticket output for multiple games are less rabid about the Dodgers than those that can only attend a few games a year.  If the mix of fans at Dodger Stadium changes and includes a smaller number that are willing to scream their guts out, it stands to reason that we’ll hear more cheers for the opposing team throughout the game, and we’ll also see more Dodger fans leaving early.

Second, the Yankees are by far the hottest regular season draw on the Dodgers’ schedule, so these tickets would be worth the most on Stub Hub, eBay, etc.  If consumers who purchased the mini-plans felt that the total cost of the required plan was too much, it’s within reason that a certain percentage would take advantage of this increased interest and sell their NYY tickets to the highest bidder, thereby reducing their total financial output for the mini-plan they quite possibly did not want in the first place.  This could then lead to even more less passionate Dodger fans, as well as more Yankee fans at the games.

I don’t have any knowledge of the Dodgers ticket-selling practices or what percentage of fans traditionally root for the visiting team at Dodger Stadium compared to this series, but I think there’s something to this.

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