Where to Go Next? Examining the Effect of Franchise Expansion and Location on Game-Level Attendance in Major League Soccer

Using a large dataset with over 4,000 game-level observations from Major League Soccer over the period 2006 to 2019 we investigate the determinants of attendance demand. Focusing on franchise expansion and location effects, we find that some decisions made by the organization had positive impacts on league revenues. While going to cities with a large population and already hosting nearby NFL or NBA teams is positively associated with game attendance, the presence of geographically close MLB and NHL teams is detrimental to MLS revenues. Our results suggest a need for a more nuanced and selective approach to MLS expansion policy.

Predicting Seasonal Performance in Professional Sport: A 30-Year Analysis of Sports Illustrated Predictions

In 2017, Sports Illustrated (SI) made headlines when their remarkable prediction from 2014 that the Houston Astros (a team in one of the lowest Major League Baseball divisional rankings) would win the World Series, came true. The less-publicised story was that in 2017, SI predicted the Los Angeles Dodgers to win the Major League Baseball (MLB) title. Assessing the forecasting accuracy of experts is critical as it explores the difficulty and limitations of forecasts and can help illuminate how predictions may shape sociocultural notions of sport in society. To thoroughly investigate SI’s forecasting record, predictions were collected from the four major North American sporting leagues (the National Football League, National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and National Hockey League) over the last 30 years (1988–2018). Kruskal–Wallis H Tests and Mann–Whitney U Tests were used to evaluate the absolute and relative accuracy of predictions. Results indicated that SI had the greatest predictive accuracy in the National Basketball Association and was significantly more likely to predict divisional winners compared to conference and league champions. Future work in this area may seek to examine multiple media outlets to gain a more comprehensive perspective on forecasting accuracy in sport.

Why Do Koreans Love Ethnic Players in the MLB? A Focus on Ethnic Identity and Player Identification

Asians hold a collectivistic culture, and they feel attachment to people who have the same ethnic background. This study explored how roles of ethnic identity influenced fan behaviors of Korean audiences toward Hyun-jin Ryu, the Korean Major League Baseball player. The results showed that ethnic identity influenced player identification, which led to attitudes toward the L.A. Dodgers. Congruence mediated the relationship between ethnic identity and player identification. It is also found that transportation mediated the relationship between player identification and attitudes toward the L.A. Dodgers. These results provide a cultural explanation of fan behaviors of ethnic players. Managerial implications can also be found.

Major League Missteps: How MLB Mishandled the Astros Cheating Scandal

Major League Baseball (MLB) has been criticized for its handling of the Astros’ cheating scandal. Researchers used a case study method to test whether Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) should be expanded to include collaborative brand attack (CBA) as a crisis type. Researchers used traditional and extended SCCT to analyze MLB’s crisis response to determine which version fit best. Data were triangulated from sports news sources, MLB’s official statement and Twitter account, and social media influencer and stakeholder posts. Researchers asked which SCCT response MLB used and whether it was effective with stakeholders. Because of poor history, MLB’s accidental crisis response mismatched the level of stakeholder attribution of responsibility. Another question examined the role of social media. Major League Baseball underestimated the role of social media and SM influencers and, by underutilizing its Twitter feed, left stakeholders to attribute greater responsibility to MLB. Two final questions asked whether SCCT should be updated to include the CBA crisis type and whether it applied in this case. The results indicate the negative consequences of crisis/response mismatch and indicate that CBA should be incorporated into SCCT to address social media influence. This is the first known study to apply CBA in a sports context.

Moments of Competitive Balance in Major League Soccer

In this paper, we investigate competitive balance in Major League Soccer and compare balance across talent acquisition policy regimes with a bias-corrected measure from 1996 to 2019. We evaluate multiple moments of the league talent distribution, and we add to past work by using multiple levels of aggregation that reveal heterogeneous results with respect to the distribution of talent within and across seasons. We show that there has been little improvement in competitive balance over the league's history, though there has been an increase in year-to-year stability in balance and a lower propensity for teams at the extremes of performance.