Is Baseball dying?

I'll bite.  Assuming it's a genuine article, given the font style I'll say 1930s - say 1937?

@Qhead Want to tally a few more guesses before a final reveal.  Smart analysis, but not the right year. 

1950-55

I'll guess 1920.  Here is an article full of similar news stories: https://www.foxsports.com/buzz...proclamations-031215

@old_school - living up to your handle!  1955 is the correct answer

@notThatRJM - Goes to show, this has been the case against baseball for over 100 years.  Probably since the start of the game. 

There are three eras of sports. They are so different they can’t be compared ...

1) Pre television

2) Television, pre cable

3) Cable

i suppose there could be a fourth in pre radio. Like most people I’ve only been alive long enough to see how big television/cable money has impacted sports. 

4th Era is streaming. Won't be long before a majority of viewers are watching via devices other than TV

3and2Fastball posted:

4th Era is streaming. Won't be long before a majority of viewers are watching via devices other than TV

100% just a matter of time. 

Is streaming going to change anything? To me, streaming just changes the delivery and where you can watch. If people aren’t watching on tv are they going to watch on their phone? Streaming isn’t going to change the money and the market saturation. Streaming has been available for baseball for several years. Viewership is in decline. I believe highlights and Red Zone like presentation is the future of broadcast sports. 

Hm, well maybe they should stop playing baseball games and just have competitive showcases as a spectator sport....(!) 

@RJM I believe it will.  Mobile consumption is often a different behavior pattern.  It’s less passive.  Consumer has far more control over how/when/where they watch.  This alters the dynamic between viewer and broadcaster.  Older viewers, even in choice expanded cable, have a programmatic, passive relationship with product.  Mobile the consumer is in the driver seat.  How does effect something like sports consumption? Eg often things like patience are impacted.  Most people hate ads on mobile, whereas they are trained to deal with them on TV (pretty important financial component in all of this).  Highlights, which used to be consumed over an hour on SportsCenter are now available seconds later on social media, or if there is an “extended “ version its 1 minute on House Of Highlights.  Streaming/mobile is not just a platform shift it’s an entire paradigm and relationship shift.  And to me that’s why sports like basketball, MMA and soccer are flourishing. And baseball, while it won’t die, will be challenged. 

Baseball is defintely not dying but the market is getting more diverse. We are living in an individualistic society where people want to have a lot of choices and taylor their free time activities to their individual needs.

It is not like in the 1950s when kids only could choose between 2-3 things, now it is tons of different things whether it is parcour running, ultimate frisbee or whatever not even talking about electronic entertainment which is not starting to be a competitive sport too.

I think baseball will always be a top5 sport but we won't get back to a time when every kid does the same in his free time, society has become to individualistic  and diverse for that.