Latest news with #BaseballFans
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Dodgers fans react to Max Muncy's big milestone amid Yankees pummeling
The post Dodgers fans react to Max Muncy's big milestone amid Yankees pummeling appeared first on ClutchPoints. The New York Yankees entered their weekend series against the Los Angeles Dodgers with something to prove. They lost the 2024 World Series in embarrassing fashion to Los Angeles. After Mookie Betts was ruled out with a toe injury, New York was hopeful that Will Warren could shut the Dodgers lineup down. Instead, New York used three pitchers in the first two innings, were they fell behind 10-0. Max Muncy hit a three-run home run, reaching a significant milestone in his 10-year career. Advertisement Muncy's home run did more than just knock Warren out of the game. It was the 200th long ball of his career. His team and Major League Baseball both captured the moment on their social media pages. The Dodgers and MLB weren't the only two accounts talking about the game on Saturday. Fans took to social media to voice their opinions on Warren's performance and Los Angeles' dominance, even without Betts on the field. 'Max Muncy owns you,' one Dodgers fan said to a Yankees supporter who made the trip to Los Angeles to watch the game. 'A four-spot in the top of the 1st? Now that's how you make an entrance!' said another fan. 'Whether it's Max Muncy going yard for No. 200, the Dodgers coming out swinging, or Kekius Maximus leading off with a 4-run crusade in Hardcore Mode—it's all about setting the tone early. Pitchers barely got their cleats dirty and they're already in damage control.' Advertisement 'That was an epic moment for Max Muncy, loved it!' posted another. 'dodgers are up 10-0 in the 2nd, max muncy 200th homer,' said a Dodgers fan, enjoying the moment. 'hyeseong kim 2nd mlb homer life is great right now!' 'Put some respect on Max f'n Muncy,' was all one fan had to say. With Shohei Ohtani getting closer to his first Dodgers start as a pitcher, Los Angeles fans have plenty to look forward to. However, their team showed out on Saturday, proving that there is still a gap between them and the Yankees.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Blue Jays outfielder made the wildest, most dramatic tumbling Catch of the Year candidate
Strap in for this one. It's quite a journey for baseball fans ... and Toronto Blue Jays outfield Daulton Varsho. We're talking about Gold Glove-winning Daulton Varsho here. And with Jarren Duran hitting a long fly ball to the warning track in Toronto on Tuesday night, Varsho got to the spot well ... but then he took a tumble. Advertisement But instead of, say, having a Jose Canseco moment, Varsho got to his knees and BACKHANDED THE BALL INTO HIS GLOVE FOR THE OUT. It's just amazing. He came up and smiled, but he definitely looked sheepish about it. And wouldn't you? Watch this whole thing and enjoy: Dude. What?! This article originally appeared on For The Win: Blue Jays catch of the year came after Daulton Varsho was falling down
New York Times
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Live Q&A: Talking baseball with Eno Sarris on Friday 5/30 at 3:00 p.m. ET
We're two months into the Major League Baseball season, and last year's World Series participants are playing each other this weekend. Eno Sarris wrote about how the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees build their starting rotations, and now he is ready to respond to questions about your fantasy teams in a live chat, exclusively for subscribers, so please submit your questions below.
Yahoo
25-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Judge insists that despite hitting .395 with 18 homers, he doesn't 'feel too great at the plate'
New York Yankees' Aaron Judge heads back to the dugout after touching home plate following his solo home run off Colorado Rockies starting pitcher Kyle Freeland in the first inning of a baseball game Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) Fans boo when New York Yankees' Aaron Judge is given an intentional walk in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Colorado Rockies, Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) New York Yankees' Aaron Judge smiles as he steps on first base after being issued an intentional walk in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Colorado Rockies, Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) New York Yankees' Aaron Judge smiles as he steps on first base after being issued an intentional walk in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Colorado Rockies, Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) New York Yankees' Aaron Judge heads back to the dugout after touching home plate following his solo home run off Colorado Rockies starting pitcher Kyle Freeland in the first inning of a baseball game Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) Fans boo when New York Yankees' Aaron Judge is given an intentional walk in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Colorado Rockies, Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) New York Yankees' Aaron Judge smiles as he steps on first base after being issued an intentional walk in the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Colorado Rockies, Saturday, May 24, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) DENVER (AP) — Aaron Judge insisted he doesn't pay too much attention to his numbers, which, for the record, are eye-opening — .395 average with 18 homers and 46 RBIs. Even more, the New York Yankees slugger hinted he's not as locked in as one might think. Advertisement 'I don't feel too great at the plate,' Judge said after New York's 13-1 win over the slumping Colorado Rockies on Saturday. 'Always a work in progress.' Now that's a scary thought. After all, he's flirting with .400 well into May. He has certainly taken a liking to Coors Field in his first regular-season visit this weekend, homering in back-to-back games. 'The stadium is great," Judge said. 'Fans always show up in numbers and it's a packed house.' For the last two days, that's largely because of Judge, whose No. 99 jersey was quite popular around the park. He also drew the loudest cheers — and boos, when the Rockies intentionally walked him during a 10-run fifth inning. It was just his ninth intentional walk of the season. Advertisement In this case, it helped set the table for the big inning in which the Yankees sent 14 batters to the plate. 'If I can get on base for those guys, they're going to do something special,' Judge explained. 'You never know what's going to happen — you've just got to stay ready to hit every single time.' Judge said he doesn't dwell too much on his numbers for one specific reason: They're reflections of the past. He prefers to look forward. 'My dad would always give me the quote, 'If what you did yesterday still seemed big today, then you haven't done anything today,'' the 6-foot-7 outfielder said. 'So it doesn't matter what you did yesterday. If you're still happy about your good game last night, then you probably haven't done anything today.' Advertisement To manager Aaron Boone, it's not a surprise Judge is hitting so well. It simply speaks to the evolution of the player who's in his 10th season. 'Ultimately, if you're going to have real success, you've got to rely on a little bit of chase with him,' Boone said. 'He's just gotten so good at not chasing. You just don't see him leave the zone that often. As dangerous as he is and as much power as he (has), when you're not leaving the strike zone, I'm sure that can't be an entirely comfortable feeling for a pitcher.' ___ AP MLB:
New York Times
23-05-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
With attendance down, Cardinals commit to improving Busch Stadium experience
ST. LOUIS — A bird's-eye view of Busch Stadium lately reveals what was once thought impossible. Nestled in the downtown of a baseball-crazed city, the St. Louis Cardinals' home stands half-full most games. Dozens of sections in the upper level sit uninhabited. Some concession stands have been vacated. The roar of a usually passionate home crowd is muted. Advertisement As the Cardinals navigate the early portion of their transition season, they have seen a significant drop-off in attendance. The Cardinals set their lowest single-game recorded attendance of the Busch Stadium III era (since 2006) with a mere 20,309 attending on April 2 game against the Los Angeles Angels. From a league-wide perspective, categorizing Busch Stadium as a ghost town would be unfair. Heading into play Friday, St. Louis had drawn 686,954 fans this season, just above league average. Their average official attendance numbers (note: not gate attendance) of 28,623 puts them at 13th in baseball. Still, for an organization that prides itself on holding a full house on a nightly basis — and one that until last year had drawn at least 3 million fans in every (non-COVID) season since the stadium opened — those numbers are far short of the norm. Just a year ago, the Cardinals averaged 35,532 fans despite finishing 10 games out of first place. This year's team is playing some of the best ball in the National League — 16-6 over its past 22 games — but the turnstiles remain slow. The dramatic decline in ticket sales did not catch the Cardinals off guard. Ownership was prepared for this scenario, and attendance has matched up with what the organization budgeted for. But efforts to entice fans to the ballpark continue to be an emphasis. As the team itself undergoes a transition year, the business side is doing the same. In what will likely be a down year in attendance, even if the team keeps up its strong play, Cardinals brass is committing to finding new ways to draw fans back to Busch Stadium. 'Frankly, with the team being in a cyclical downturn, we are creating that urgency to do absolutely everything we can to make the game and the experience more fun and more exciting,' team president Bill DeWitt III told The Athletic. The organization's experiment? Improving — and in some areas, revamping — the game-day experience. That's where senior vice president of business operations Anuk Karunaratne comes into play. Advertisement The Cardinals hired Karunaratne ahead of the 2024 season, when longtime senior vice president for sales and marketing Dan Farrell retired. Karunaratne drew praise for his work with the Toronto Blue Jays, where he served as the executive vice president of business operations. His responsibilities included overseeing business administration, team sales and marketing, and the fan experience at Rogers Centre. Now he's doing much of the same with the Cardinals, but the task remains challenging. Encouraging a dissatisfied fan base to come to the stadium, even with the team's strong start, is no easy feat. But it is crucial when considering the organization's long-term sustainability. 'Obviously, when you go into the part of the cycle that we're in now, you know your opportunities to grow the fan base are less than when the team is winning,' Karunaratne said. 'But the things you focus on from the business side are still the same. We focused on building an understanding of our fans, existing and prospective, and tried to look at what we needed to do (to improve). What audiences do we need to connect with or establish with in order to maintain and strengthen our fandom — and increase their likelihood of attending?' Karunaratne's efforts have centered on bringing in younger fans. He noted Cardinals' baseball tradition resonates with several generations, but said that the organization needs to be cognizant of all generations when mapping out the in-game experience. That's why many of the team's new directives focus on appealing to fans in their 20s to 30s. A few examples: The Cardinals have launched $5 Friday nights at Budweiser Terrace, the gathering spot in the upper deck in right field, where fans can purchase $5 hot dogs, $5 draft beers and $6 margaritas all game long, with live music and a DJ. It's the first event of its kind at the stadium, and it's designed to turn the game into a social event. Advertisement St. Louis is also following in the footsteps of many other teams by adding a post-game summer concert series for the first time. Two shows are on the schedule: country singer Cole Swindell will perform on June 20 after the Cardinals play the Cincinnati Reds, and hip-hop star Flo Rida will take the stage on July 15 after St. Louis takes on the Atlanta Braves. 'What was clearly a big priority is thinking about how we connect with a new generation and a younger fan base that has very different expectations about attending a live event and how they consume the game,' Karunaratne explained. 'What that group of people is looking for looks different than prior generations. The challenge is, you have to be able to deliver multiple different experiences. There is no longer a one-size-fits-all approach.' At the same time, the Cardinals don't want to alienate their fans who come to games strictly for the baseball experience. But they do want to modernize that experience. Over the offseason, the team underwent a multi-million-dollar scoreboard graphic renovation project. The updated technology allows for trending stats, such as exit velocity, launch angle and vertical and horizontal break to be available in real time, alongside the standard stats like velocity and pitch type. 'We changed the scoreboard presentation because we were trying to think about how we can bring in more stats and create more of a compelling scoreboard look for people who are watching the game and do want to see some of the advanced stats,' Karunaratne said. 'For more of our baseball-centric audience, we're trying to enhance that experience.' The Cardinals also replaced and rewired their speaker system throughout the ballpark, and installed a control system so they can manage different sound levels — and different sounds altogether — in various sections. Some sections will play music, while others will feature either the television or radio broadcast. 'This is all part of the process,' DeWitt said. 'We want to be in a much more creative and experimental phase of what works and what doesn't as we look at fan segmentation and attracting younger fans, but also serving our long-term fans too.' Now, the simple solution for drawing more fans is to field a winning product. That is not lost on the ownership or president of baseball operations John Mozeliak. Busch Stadium did not earn its moniker as 'Baseball Heaven' for nothing. If the Cardinals are playing well, the fan base will respond accordingly. But with most ticket sales coming via season ticket packages (most of which are purchased before the season ), it will be hard to make up for the deficit already. Advertisement 'This is about where we thought we'd be,' DeWitt said. 'Now, hopefully, we can exceed that given the better team performance lately, but that remains to be seen. A big chunk of our ticket sales — usually around 70 percent — happen before the season. So it's really almost impossible to catch up to where we might have been in previous years. But if we can exceed our budget, then it creates all sorts of opportunities to make things a little easier.' For now, the Cardinals will operate under some financial restraints. Upgrading the fan experience, while necessary, does come at a cost. That those changes are happening simultaneously with the changes being made on the baseball side is no coincidence. 'We have transitions happening on both the baseball and the business side,' DeWitt said. 'We feel really good about the leadership on both sides, and they do require investments. The investments are being made when revenues are in decline, for obvious reasons. But this is one of those things where we feel it's important to be laying the groundwork for future success. 'If everything goes well on the field, that's great, but in order to sustain it, you need a sustainable economic business model. We feel like we were there for a long period of time, and I think we have the team that will get us back to that. Everyone focuses on the baseball side mostly, which is understandable, but it's just as important on the business side.' In their attempts to attract more fans, the Cardinals won't stray from the ideas that have reliably brought success. 'We always have and always will be super focused on our promotional dates and giveaways, things that entice certain groups to come to the game,' DeWitt said. 'But in doing that, we have sometimes lost sight of why people really come. Baseball is unique in that it owns the summer. We're trying to reach everybody, all of these different groups, in a different way.' The summer months will be the true test for the organization. Their upcoming series, a three-game set against the Arizona Diamondbacks over Memorial Day Weekend, should serve as a checkpoint. It helps that the Cardinals' recent surge has helped propel them from five games under .500 in mid-April to three games behind the first-place Chicago Cubs in the division. Advertisement But even if the Cardinals' play fades, the organization will continue trying to improve the game-day experience. Bringing fans to the ballpark is vital to the organization's future. 'More than anything, we're recommitting to our purpose on the business side, which is to grow our brand, to find ways to authentically connect with our fans and provide them with a world-class entertainment experience,' Karunaratne said. 'If we can do those things and do them well, I think we'll have fulfilled the part of the promise that we're responsible for. 'There's always the piece of how does the team play? This year, that's different than past years — Mozeliak and ownership have talked about the plan to get back to where we want to be on the baseball side of things. But in the interim, whatever the final attendance numbers this year are, we are still going to have millions of people coming through our gates, and we owe it to those people to give them a top experience.' (Top photo of Victor Scott II at Busch Stadium on May 7: Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Images)
