This book explores the unique relationships between professional baseball teams and the unique ways professional baseball leagues are organized in North America with a primary focus on how proximity can and does impact consumer demand. Perhaps more than any other matter that arises in the business of baseball, proximity to other professional baseball teams is a concern that has uniquely shaped professional baseball leagues in North America. It is this particular component in how professional baseball leagues are organized that suggests building a proximity-based approach to studying the economics of minor league baseball. This book opens up new ways to study minor league baseball, specifically, and sports leagues more generally. So even as advanced technology has eliminated some of the need for fans to be in close proximity to the teams they love to follow, there is still a need to understand more completely how proximity matters can impact the way professional baseball leagues are structured and how that structure can ultimately impact the quality of the games that entertain sports fans everywhere. This book will be of interest to both sports economists and practitioners.

Autorentext
Dr. Rhoads is Professor of Economics at Towson University where he has taught Sports Economics and Macroeconomics Principles since 1999. He has authored papers on minor league baseball, professional golf, and other applied microeconomics topics that have appeared in academic journals including Contemporary Economic Policy, Economics Letters, Journal of Sports Economics, and Southern Economic Journal. He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Wyoming.

Inhalt

Proximity and Minor League Baseball.- Proximity's impact on minor league baseball attendance.- Regionalization of Affiliated Minor League Teams.- Another affiliation allocation model.- Some select proposed affiliation switches.- What does this all mean and where do we go from here?.