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CoreSoftball20

Wilson = Evil Empire
DFP Vendor
Dec 27, 2012
6,213
113
Kunkletown, PA
Again, agree to disagree JD...you can keep bringing up NBA and WNBA all you want. LMK when this pro softball hot ticket gets funded with nobody in the seats and barely any audience for any TV game

And since you keep bringing up the NBA and WNBA,

1) There are 12 WNBA team owners, whose teams collectively own 50% of the WNBA. The other 50% of the WNBA is owned, collectively, by the 30 NBA owners, through a company called "WNBA Holdings." So, the NBA basically owns the WNBA and makes money off it so it
would benefit from it making money...so the NBA DOES make money if the WNBA does well. Attendance, merchandise...yada yada.

2) NBA and WNBA are inherently the same game, where as baseball is not softball. If you can get a young woman to go
to a WNBA game who hasnt been to any basketball games or start watching the WNBA because she plays basketball or likes
it...there is a darn good chance she will become a fan of an NBA team and attend a game, buy merchandise..yada yada. Bingo, thats
where the money is.

This is not the same thing for baseball and softball. You might convince a young girl who likes to play softball to finally go to a
softball game or watch it...BUT...if she didnt like MLB or watch it before, she still wont go to a baseball game or buy anything
baseball related just because she went to see a pro softball game. Same thing for her parents, they could care less about
baseball. So it does nothing for MLB to pay for pro softball. And worse yet, you may actually lose a family on a Saturday
that may go to a softball game instead of your main product that pays the bills...MLB baseball.
MLB would be getting jack squat for their money investment.

And still, fact of the matter, softball girls dont even want to watch pro softball. So you think they are gonna buy jerseys of
pro softball players or any merchandise much yet tickets to watch it.
 
Last edited:
Sep 3, 2018
87
0
Nobody watches pro women's sports. If the nba didn't subsidize the wnba, it would have died years ago as well. What are there, 3 teams in npf? None out west so why does anyone care about it?
 
Apr 16, 2013
1,113
83
Nobody watches pro women's sports. If the nba didn't subsidize the wnba, it would have died years ago as well. What are there, 3 teams in npf? None out west so why does anyone care about it?

A very stupid statement with zero facts. Yes men's sports make a lot more, fact. However, sports like tennis, golf, soccer, and ESPECIALLY MMA have a pretty damn large audience. If nobody watches women in sports, then I'll gladly take Serena Williams', Maria Sharapova's, and Rhonda Rousey's paycheck. If you want to tell me they make the majority of their money from sponsorships/advertising, I'll thank you for proving my point and call it a day.
 

CoreSoftball20

Wilson = Evil Empire
DFP Vendor
Dec 27, 2012
6,213
113
Kunkletown, PA
Im sure he was just exaggerating the point when he said nobody watches...but much, much less watch womens sports than the mens.

Compared to mens sports, womens sports just dont get the audience. Is it fair...no. But its fact.

Im not even going to get into the 3 women you brought up if you think they have their money because of their sport's viewers...rather
than who they are and what they look like...haha.
 
Last edited:
Jun 6, 2016
2,712
113
Chicago
Im sure he was just exaggerating the point when he said nobody watches...but much, much less watch womens sports than the mens.

Compared to mens sports, womens sports just dont get the audience. Is it fair...no. But its fact.

Im not even going to get into the 3 women you brought up if you think they have their money because of their sport's viewers.

Women's tennis gets higher TV ratings than men's tennis (all the time? I don't know. It probably depends on the quality of the match. But it happens). WNBA games get around 400,000 viewers on ESPN2. A lot less than the NBA! But that's still a lot of people watching.

But again, you're shifting the goalposts here. Nobody is arguing that a women's softball league can or needs to have the following of MLB. That's an unrealistic, unfair, and unnecessary standard. We're arguing that a league can be viable.

Right now, ESPNU is showing Professional Cornhole, so, yeah, I do think there's a market for professional softball if we had a league run by competent people with decent financial and promotional backing.
 
Oct 11, 2010
8,337
113
Chicago, IL
We had a Team 10 minutes from our house, Bandits?, where Jenny Finch was pitching. (You are from Chicago area, I am in Lisle area where they played for awhile). I heard nothing but good things about them, players talking to girls before and after the game and being extremely nice. Great experience, reviews and people we talked to.

DD and I discussed it but never made it to 1 game. Tickets were inexpensive to.

I do not think I am alone.

We tried to setup a League event to go to game, participation was disappointing.
 
Sep 3, 2018
87
0
Men won't go watch women's team sports because they believe they can play the sport better. Straight women won't go watch women's team sports because they're not attracted to the players and there aren't any men there to go with. It's an American cultural thing, even soccer failed after pulling 100k fans for the world cup in Pasadena
Even the single A baseball teams in Podunk towns like Adelanto out draw npf games.
 

CoreSoftball20

Wilson = Evil Empire
DFP Vendor
Dec 27, 2012
6,213
113
Kunkletown, PA
But again, you're shifting the goalposts here. Nobody is arguing that a women's softball league can or needs to have the following of MLB. That's an unrealistic, unfair, and unnecessary standard. We're arguing that a league can be viable.

Nobody is shifting anything...someone else brought up Tennis, not me...so dont say I shifted anything, as I only
commented towards another post.

MLB has been brought up by a ton of people in here about sponsoring and you brought up the NBA and WNBA, so again, all I have done
is kept up with the conversations.

My opinion hasnt changed...softball league will not be viable until people watch and attend. Look at Quincy's
post...they were close and never went. I guarantee he is not alone...they couldnt even get a group of local SOFTBALL GIRLS
to go to a game even at CHEAP ticket prices. If that doesnt say it all, I dont know what does.

And I am not against a league, I would love to see one succeed. But all I hear is about how others should subsudize it, I
dont hear anything about why anybody should consider doing so considering the sport's own players arent fans and
dont care to watch/attend.
 
Last edited:
Jul 14, 2018
982
93
But you do touch on something I find interesting: Girls don't seem to want to watch, especially on television. I agree that the girls who play for me who really love the sport all have favorite baseball players, but they don't go out of their way to watch softball. Why is that? Is it just because baseball is more established?

Niche sports can be successful. Niche sports can grow. I strongly disagree with so many here who don't seem to think that's the case.

I wish this weren't true, but it is. Every February when ESPN starts to show NCAA softball games, I make a big deal and tell my daughter "there's softball on TV this afternoon when you get home from school!" I made her some diagrams to chart pitches and we talk about everyone's approach. She lasts three innings, tops.

As far as niche sports, someone mentioned professional cornhole being on ESPN. I've seen pro darts being advertised on BBC America in recent weeks. It's beyond frustrating when it seems there's an audience for just about anything but no pro softball. Maybe the Olympics will make a difference, but for all the success and popularity the women's soccer team had in the early 2000's it never translated into a successful pro soccer league for women either (WPS folded in 2012, NWSL has been around since 2013).
 

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