Why baseball left Montreal

From what I've read it seems like some of you want the Expos to move while
others want them to stay in Montreal. I'll give you some of the reasons
why they left Montreal.

First, how do you expect a team to survive in a market where they have no
radio or television contracts, little or no support from local businesses,
no corporate sponsor, no local owner, and few fans? Montreal was a great
city for baseball at one time, but those days are long gone. Smaller
cities in the United States give their MLB teams more support than
Montreal gave their Expos during the last 5 years.

Second, I noticed that someone wrote about the team being "abandoned by
baseball and not by fans." It was actually abandoned by both parties. I
have to admit that Major League Baseball did not treat the team well when
they bought it for contraction and gave the team an small payroll, in
addition to moving some of the games to other locations. However, the fans
didn't help either. There are other baseball teams that have fairly low
attendance at their home games (Royals, Brewers, Marlins, Devil Rays,
White Sox) but those teams have not had such low attendance at a
consistent rate during the last decade as the Expos had during the same
time period. On many nights during the 2004 season there was only 1 person
for every 10 seats in Olympic Stadium, and a few times that figure was
even more dismal. I know there are Expos fans, but there aren't enough of
them to support the team in its home market.

Third, the lack of fan attendance in Montreal is what caused baseball to
consider contraction. The contraction talk hurt the team, but attendance
was down before the contraction talk ever began. If the Expos had better
support during the 1990s then baseball would have never considered the
Expos for contraction. The residents of Canada can thank the Americans for
supporting the Minnesota Twins when that team was a target for
contraction. Because there were enough people who cared about the Twins
the team made a recovery on the field and in the stands, so the Expos were
saved from contraction because baseball could no longer contract the
Twins. However, the residents of Montreal gave Bud Selig more reasons to
move the team because attendance continued to decline each year, so that
is why the team is moving.

Fourth, no one in Montreal stepped forward to buy the team before Jeffrey
Loria came into the picture. I'm sure there is someone in Montreal who
could have bought the team and paid for the acquisition of new players and
paid part of the price for a new stadium. But no one stepped up to the
plate and the Quebec government struck down the stadium proposal. If the
owners hadn't sold all their good players away, like the Florida Marlins
did after the 1997 World Series, and a new stadium had been built then
baseball could have secured its future in Montreal.

I don't know what will happen next year, but if the move to Washington
falls through and the team moves back to Montreal then the fans and city
must show that they will support a baseball team. It's irrelevant to
consider that Olympic Stadium used to sell out because those days have
been gone for a long time. Canadiens (and some Americans) don't seem to
understand that the reason why the Expos are the latest in a string of
failed Canadien professional teams (Winnepeg Jets, Quebec Nordiques,
Vancouver Grizzlies, Montreal Expos) is that the local market showed no
interest in keeping the team until it was too late. Baseball is a
business, and because the Expos lost money in its home market and
attendance figures continued to decline it's understandable why baseball
moved some of the home games to other locations to cut their losses. This
move hurt the Montreal market, but the attendance for those games in
Montreal probably would have been no better than the attendance in the
other locations. If you were the owner of a business that lost $20 million
or so each year, wouldn't you make a change so your company wouldn't
continue to lose money indefinitely?

Not to be picky, but it's 'CanadiAns'.

Honestly, you Americens crack me up.


"baseballfan100" <pottsb29.TakeThisOut@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3b5959e41dd2d6ed0099794f8a67989f@localhost.talkaboutbaseball.com...
> From what I've read it seems like some of you want the Expos to move while
> others want them to stay in Montreal. I'll give you some of the reasons
> why they left Montreal.
>
> First, how do you expect a team to survive in a market where they have no
> radio or television contracts, little or no support from local businesses,
> no corporate sponsor, no local owner, and few fans? Montreal was a great
> city for baseball at one time, but those days are long gone. Smaller
> cities in the United States give their MLB teams more support than
> Montreal gave their Expos during the last 5 years.
>
> Second, I noticed that someone wrote about the team being "abandoned by
> baseball and not by fans." It was actually abandoned by both parties. I
> have to admit that Major League Baseball did not treat the team well when
> they bought it for contraction and gave the team an small payroll, in
> addition to moving some of the games to other locations. However, the fans
> didn't help either. There are other baseball teams that have fairly low
> attendance at their home games (Royals, Brewers, Marlins, Devil Rays,
> White Sox) but those teams have not had such low attendance at a
> consistent rate during the last decade as the Expos had during the same
> time period. On many nights during the 2004 season there was only 1 person
> for every 10 seats in Olympic Stadium, and a few times that figure was
> even more dismal. I know there are Expos fans, but there aren't enough of
> them to support the team in its home market.
>
> Third, the lack of fan attendance in Montreal is what caused baseball to
> consider contraction. The contraction talk hurt the team, but attendance
> was down before the contraction talk ever began. If the Expos had better
> support during the 1990s then baseball would have never considered the
> Expos for contraction. The residents of Canada can thank the Americans for
> supporting the Minnesota Twins when that team was a target for
> contraction. Because there were enough people who cared about the Twins
> the team made a recovery on the field and in the stands, so the Expos were
> saved from contraction because baseball could no longer contract the
> Twins. However, the residents of Montreal gave Bud Selig more reasons to
> move the team because attendance continued to decline each year, so that
> is why the team is moving.
>
> Fourth, no one in Montreal stepped forward to buy the team before Jeffrey
> Loria came into the picture. I'm sure there is someone in Montreal who
> could have bought the team and paid for the acquisition of new players and
> paid part of the price for a new stadium. But no one stepped up to the
> plate and the Quebec government struck down the stadium proposal. If the
> owners hadn't sold all their good players away, like the Florida Marlins
> did after the 1997 World Series, and a new stadium had been built then
> baseball could have secured its future in Montreal.
>
> I don't know what will happen next year, but if the move to Washington
> falls through and the team moves back to Montreal then the fans and city
> must show that they will support a baseball team. It's irrelevant to
> consider that Olympic Stadium used to sell out because those days have
> been gone for a long time. Canadiens (and some Americans) don't seem to
> understand that the reason why the Expos are the latest in a string of
> failed Canadien professional teams (Winnepeg Jets, Quebec Nordiques,
> Vancouver Grizzlies, Montreal Expos) is that the local market showed no
> interest in keeping the team until it was too late. Baseball is a
> business, and because the Expos lost money in its home market and
> attendance figures continued to decline it's understandable why baseball
> moved some of the home games to other locations to cut their losses. This
> move hurt the Montreal market, but the attendance for those games in
> Montreal probably would have been no better than the attendance in the
> other locations. If you were the owner of a business that lost $20 million
> or so each year, wouldn't you make a change so your company wouldn't
> continue to lose money indefinitely?
>