The fans sold out every fucking game for 6 years. In Cleveland. Didn't make a difference.
The economic reality is that if ownership was willing to spend competitively, the Indians would have dominated the sport for 10-15 years instead of half that. We saw it once and we are seeing a lesser version of it again. Cleveland supported it the first time, it didn't matter.
Jacobs was a different type of owner than the older Dolan was also. Jacobs was also one of the first owners in the modern era who would pay for young players before they hit arbitration and extend them into free agency. Dolan didn't keep up that style of ownership and also didn't draft well, so it really hurt us in the end. Trust me i hated how the Indians were ran and I was very vocal about it
This team actually is run by the younger Dolan and we also have supporting minority owner when it comes to payroll, so they are way more willing to do Jacobs system again hence why a lot of our younger players are signed long term already. If you think about it, most of the core from the last 5-6 years got extended while here in Cleveland and I expect in due time guys like Clev, Bieber, Bauers, etc will get the same type of treatment before/when they hit arbitration years. We have been drafting and developing way better than we were in the early Dolan years and now because they put the money and resources into that, we have a much better organization from top to bottom and its considered one of the best in baseball.
The fans showed up in the 90s because the team was great and they didn't know the inevitable, which can simply be summarized as: "enjoy them while you have them"
And having a league average payroll for just a couple years obviously isn't enough.
Cleveland had a franchise record for payroll in 18, which was 15th, but they had a bottom 15th attendance. Attendance is one of the most important things for bringing in a lot of money. Give them a top 15 in attendance, they bring in around 80-100 mil more in a season based off of numbers. Don't expect any team with a bottom level attendance to keep a top 15 payroll. No ownership runs a business for long when they put out more than they get in, so don't expect a business to do so.
Baseball is also pretty unfair as well, top payroll was 227 Mil, Boston, last season and lowest, 68 Mil, Tampa. Football and basketball there isn't normally gaps like this at all, since the leagues does not allow it. Until there is a min cap and hard top cap, any small market team money wise cannot compete with the big boys. It is not possible and Also you forget to factor in Clevelands market is smaller than it was in the 90s as well. We have less people in Northeastern, Ohio. We get great TV ratings because we still have the 90s fans, but a fair amount of them left when the rustbelt era started as well. We are setting record franchise payrolls in an even smaller market than the 90s was. Dont expect us to be able to keep it up, when the economic gap between the top and the bottom in baseball is so big and our market is smaller than it once was.
