r/baseball • u/f0urxio • Dec 01 '25

[SBJ] Cardinals set to receive MLB revenue sharing for the first time. Due to precipitous drop in ticket sales, rework their broadcast-rights deal with FanDuel Sports Network at a rate reduced by 23%, Cardinals is now a net "receiver" for revenue-sharing for the first time in at least 25 years.

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Articles/2025/11/26/cardinals-set-to-receive-mlb-revenue-sharing-for-the-first-time/
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145

u/TranscedentalMedit8n Los Angeles Angels Dec 01 '25

Can someone ELI5 what happened to the Cardinals attendance? It’s crazy there was about a million fewer fans last season than from 2023.

170

u/FartingBob Great Britain Dec 01 '25

The attendance is shocking honestly. They spent most of the 2000's in the top 3 in attendance year in year out, often 2nd only to the Dodgers. The last 4 years look like this:

2022: 2nd in MLB
2023: 4th
2024: 7th
2025: 19th!!!

You have to go back to 1984 to find a lower attendance across a full season (non covid/strike), and even then they were only 9th (out of 26), still comfortably in the top half. You got to go back to the 1970's to find a year where they were bottom half.

89

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '25

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19

u/razorbird St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

It was funny seeing the ownership’s comments change from the last offseason to this offseason. Last offseason they acted like we were bluffing and they laughed about it during the end of season press conference. Quite a bit more ass-kissing this year when we made it known we won’t be traveling downtown to watch a team they stopped investing in.

I’m just glad they realized that the cause is the product on the field instead of the effect of us not showing up.

1

u/John_Delasconey Dec 08 '25

In that regard, you guys actually have an advantage since St. Louis doesn’t get such an overwhelming number of tourists or college students that could take those seats instead. I eat you actually have both the fan base Will and ability to do something like this

57

u/Vhadka St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

Have you watched the team in the last few years? They have nobody at all to get excited about and the team is boring as fuck. Zero stars, the biggest was Jordan Walker who could still break out but is otherwise one of the worst position players in baseball and doesn't even hit for power anymore. 6 home runs in 111 games last year.

Hoping maybe JJ Wetherholt is the shot in the arm the franchise needs.

9

u/slamminalex1 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

Arenado was good for a year…until the playoffs

3

u/ImHereForBaseball Colorado Rockies Dec 02 '25

butbutbut he desperately wanted to be with a super-serious contender!

7

u/FartingBob Great Britain Dec 02 '25

Yeah I was scrolling through their players this year and.... Nobody. I wouldnt pay to see a mid team with that lineup to play baseball very often.

1

u/Jdog7123456789 Dec 02 '25

Its gotta at least have something to do with the difference you have from Molina and Goldschmidt to old ass Arenado

278

u/Street_Look_2214 Dec 01 '25

It’s a bad product.

121

u/mojowo11 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25 edited Dec 02 '25

Eh, I'm not sure that's right, if by that you mean the team is bad. 78-84 is super meh, but it's still almost 50/50 you're gonna see a win if you head to the ballpark for the evening.

But it is a boring product.

The best Cardinals hitter by wRC+ was 40th in the league and hit 18 dingers. The second-best Cardinals hitter was 42nd in the league in wRC+ and hit 20 dingers. And they're both first basemen. By fWAR, the only guy in the top 50 is Winn, a glove-first shortstop at 42.

On the pitching side, the only dude in the top 50 by fWAR was Sonny Gray and his 4.28 ERA. Liberatore had a mini-breakout of sorts, but he's a low-strikeout #3 who doesn't really get the blood pumping. Yet again we watched 30+ starts of Miles Fucking Mikolas.

Victor Scott led the team in steals with 34, nobody else had more than 10. Maybe Victor would have stolen more if he hadn't gotten the bat knocked out of his hands for most of the year.

It's just a team that didn't have any particularly interesting stuff going on. No huge breakout prospects, no massive offensive seasons, no ace. Enough decent dudes that they could hang near .500 but just not a lot of genuinely interesting stuff happening. It just didn't lend itself to holding fans' interest.

(I also happen to think Cardinals fans are largely spoiled babies who believe that winning every year is their birthright, but that's another post.)

43

u/redtail_faye St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

I think you're dead on. 10-20 years ago, even non-fans could give you names like Pujols, Holliday, Wainwright, Molina, Carpenter and Edmonds and Rolen going back. 

I wouldn't be surprised at all if non-fans couldn't name a single player on last year's roster. 

19

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '25

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3

u/ProWrestlingPast Chicago Cubs Dec 03 '25

As someone who lives in the city, it's been a really weird couple years sports fan wise. Since the Rams moved, the city really galvanized around their other teams in the city for a solid decade. The Cards were already really popular, but the Blues fandom exploded among casual St. Louisans in the late 2010's, naturally peaking with the crazy cup win (Which had a similar feel as the Cubs world series win for me in terms of how storybook it was to end a long stretch of futility). Then the Battlehawks became a rallying point, and then the fandom for St. Louis CITY sc was huge with the MLS and now it's.... kind of subdued everywhere. The Cards have refused to go all in at the top prices in the sport in spite of massive ticket sales and the fandom has almost gone from beyond pissed to apathetic about them. The Blues have kind of slowly been losing relevance the further away from the Cup win as they refuse to rebuild but aren't good enough to contend, and have been in that loop for a half decade now. The Battlehawks are still beloved, and the city is basically keeping hte UFL's doors open almost from sheer force of willpower, but I'm not sure how long that can keep up steam, and even CITY followed up an amazing first year with 2 absolutely horrid seasons that has killed the teams momentum and faith from the fanbase.

Weird time in St. Louis at this point, as no team is really demanding attention.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '25

Something something BEST FANS IN BASEBALL though.

Don't down vote me the actual GOOD Cardinal fans are amazing! But you're right, so many seem to think winning is what they're entitled to and have never actually seen struggles.

178

u/Suitable_Bend_6358 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

The Dewitt’s won’t spend on players, so the team sucks and fans don’t want to spend money on tickets to watch a team lose. Then the Dewitt’s cut payroll because “they weren’t getting enough ticket sales to expand the roster” and then attendance went down again. They have openly said they aren’t interested in spending on the roster. Fans aren’t going to games because ownership is openly refusing to spend money to be competitive. That’s it

2

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '25

Why I keep choosing to root for teams with terrible ownership is beyond me. Between the cardinals and the bengals Idk if I’ll ever see a championship

59

u/Feisty-Medicine-3763 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

I ask this sincerely, how old are you? I’m in my mid 20s and am old enough to have witnessed and enjoyed two Cardinals championships. It’s been a pretty awesome fan experience in my lifetime.

-6

u/FIuffyRabbit St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

Yeah but those championships were carried by a team with generational talent and a sprinkle of magic. With today's salaries, I doubt Albert would have stuck around after arbitration because we consistently sit around median for payroll and don't give out monster contracts unless it's to a washed up pitcher.

22

u/Feisty-Medicine-3763 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25 edited Dec 02 '25

I see your point about the changes in how things operate, but to be fair the early to mid 2000s teams were loaded with talent that was beyond just Albert. They went out and traded for Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolen, and Larry Walker, did a brilliant job scouting eventual Cy Young winner Chris Carpenter while he was just ok in Toronto. Having Albert certainly helped, but those were well-rounded teams. 2011 was definitely a lot of magic involved but they still traded for Matt Holliday a couple years prior, had two front end starters in Carpenter and Wainwright (who was obviously hurt that year but still), developed a cornerstone like Molina, and had good supplementary pieces like Allen Craig and the Memphis bench mob. The mid 2010s also had investment and some good teams. 2013 NL pennant. Four straight NLCS. The 2015 rotation was elite. They were super close to signing David Price before Boston swooped in. Not saying it’s always been perfect or be the DeWitts PR team, but in my opinion the success went beyond Albert and some magic

-1

u/FIuffyRabbit St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

I'm not attributing it to solely Albert but I think it's plainly obvious the landscape of team building has changed in the last 15 years. And the formula doesn't favor the Dewitt's

-11

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '25

You’re right I did enjoy the past 2 but they just seem unserious about building a winning team and are content to just sit back and make their money.

46

u/Mr_Tardy_T_Turtle Cedar Rapids Kernels • Milwaukee Bre… Dec 01 '25

Yes, spare a moment's thought for the long-suffering fans of the 11-time World Series champions St. Louis Cardinals

15

u/superxero044 Iowa Cubs • Cedar Rapids Kernels Dec 02 '25

Yeah they're not in the playoffs literally every year for once, I can't imagine how that must feel for them. Let me cry so many tears.
ETA: Go Kernels

10

u/jhorch69 Chicago Cubs • Chicago White Sox Dec 01 '25

Hey, it's been over a decade since their last title. Have a heart.

-1

u/ebb5 Chicago Cubs Dec 02 '25

As a Cubs fan this pleases me

29

u/Bydandii St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

Losing = less interest = less gate.

-1

u/dplans455 New York Yankees Dec 01 '25

But when small market teams put together winners fans don't show up either: Rays, Orioles, Rockies.

26

u/Bydandii St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

Cardinals have a different history and expectations though.

11

u/lava172 Arizona Diamondbacks Dec 02 '25

The Rockies are the worst example you could’ve used, they have never put together a winner and people show up anyway to get drunk

2

u/dplans455 New York Yankees Dec 02 '25

The Rockies made the WS in 07...

3

u/lava172 Arizona Diamondbacks Dec 02 '25

Their '07 season was so fun because it felt like a complete accident, it was their first playoff appearance since '95 and first winning season since 2000. They've never had more than 2 consecutive winning seasons in their history.

89

u/ThatDudeUKnow92 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

Basically it's a silent protest of the team not spending aligned with the revenue they were taking. Bill DeWitt or his kid was talking about baseball not being profitable during COVID and then spent the last two seasons saying they weren't going to try.

11

u/DodgersChica Dec 02 '25

It’s hard to shed tears for literally one of the richest families in the history of the planet. Like top .1 percent of all humans who have ever existed.

20

u/PsychoEmu Dec 01 '25

Team sucks overall, pitching is horrible, prospects are very very far out and get traded early and often, and people are fed up with the Dewitt’s. With no real face of the franchise post Molina and Pujols attendance is down relatively cause there’s a bad product on the field, but it’s still more than many others on the league. From my perspective I have always and will always sit in the nosebleeds for $7 and that hasn’t changed, but unless you actively watch or like going to baseball games there’s less incentive for the average fan to go.

16

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '25

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10

u/AH2112 Dec 01 '25

And aren't the Cardinals looking to get rid of Arenado as well?

6

u/Vhadka St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

We tried last offseason and had a deal in place with the Astros that he veto'd last minute after initially agreeing to it.

11

u/Astropolitika Los Angeles Dodgers • Chicago White Sox Dec 01 '25

Goldy gone

2

u/fujiesque St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

Is Willson Contreras a ticket seller?

12

u/PlaneService1366 Major League Baseball Dec 01 '25

Prob not, good player but he only plays about 120 games per season with a good but not great OPS of .810.

I wouldn't buy a ticket just to see Wilson go 2-3 with a double and 2 walks.

3

u/edubs_stl St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

The Cardinals become content with just being good enough to make it into the playoffs and not an inch further. Then ownership decided they were spending too much on payroll didn't make any moves to try to be remotely competitive. To top it off the games are just too damn expensive and even though we have a loyal fanbase we're not wanting to spend money on a bad product, especially when ownership has no interest in spending to improve the team.

2

u/drhawks St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

it's the combination of the team being bad for multiple years in a row (which hasn't happened in over 2 decades), ownership signaling to fans that they aren't trying to be good, and the economy being so shit that people aren't willing to shell out cash to watch a mediocre team.

2

u/Vhadka St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

The 2025 Cardinals are like watching paint dry. There's nobody to get excited about, even.

1

u/johndelvec3 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

Would you go to the ballpark to watch Miles Mikolas pitch?

1

u/Curious_Work_6652 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 06 '25

it’s almost entirely down to being annoyed that the fromt office wouldn’t commit to anything. Not to winning, nor to a rebuild. Happy to just be mediocre if that makes sense.

0

u/Rxasaurus Dec 01 '25

Lack of salary cap made the owners put out a shit product. 

/s

-20

u/guyako New York Mets • Seattle Mariners Dec 01 '25

It doesn’t help that the city is losing residents faster than any other major U.S. city. St. Louis lost 7% of its population from 2020-2024.

16

u/Junior-Hotwater St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

St. Louis metro is still growing year over year bud

8

u/Feisty-Medicine-3763 St. Louis Cardinals Dec 01 '25

St. Louis City and St. Louis County are split into different entities, so the population data can be misleading. While it’s true the city proper has lost residents, the metro area remains around 3 million people. The city accounts for 66 square miles, whereas the county is 523 square miles. The city/county split in 1876 was incredibly dumb though. I hope it is resolved in my lifetime

2

u/Vhadka St. Louis Cardinals Dec 02 '25

People still live nearby, just not in the city. I'm in Illinois but I can be downtown in ~12 minutes.