Arte Moreno Again Slaps Fans in the Face

Arte Moreno spoke to reporters from Tempe yesterday and says he's giving the fans what they want.

The number one thing fans want is affordability. They want affordability. They want safety, and they want a good experience when they come to the ballpark. Believe it or not, winning is not in their top five.Arte Moreno

If true, that is very good for Arte Moreno who took over a team fresh off a World Series championship and has led it to a decade of consecutive losing seasons. The team rebounded from a franchise record 99 loss season to drop another 90 last season. This year, projections have them losing 96 games, which is Arte's new normal.

The last time the Angels had a winning record Apple had just unveiled the iPhone 6, Taylor Swift was singing "Shake It Off," and the world was still a half decade away from knowing what a coronavirus was.

At that time, the Angels were still two years away from landing Shohei Ohtani in the greatest gift of the baseball gods a franchise has ever received. They had him for minimum wage for two season and still lost more than they won.

The losing is all on Arte and his crew.

It isn't often you can draw a circle around the exact moment that changes everything in a franchise. But with the Angels that is simple. November 14, 2009 doomed the franchise, it just took a while for the stink to reach the field.

In October of 2009 the Angels wrapped up their third consecutive AL West championship. The team finally vanquished their October nemisis in Boston then took the Yankees to game 6 of the ALCS. Loaded with talent and still possesing a decent farm system, the Angels were looking like winners for years to come.

A couple of weeks later, Arte appointed his friends John Carpino and Dennis Kuhl as President and Chairman of the organization, respectively.

To be fair, by this point Arte had already replaced the greatest executive in franchise history, Bill Stoneman, with an intern named Tony Reagins who missed his flight to his first Winter Meetings. Reagins then proceeded to fire the scout who landed Mike Trout, Tyler Skaggs, Randall Grichuk, and Garrett Richards in the same draft. That firing of Eddie Bane took place in 2010, under Kuhl and Carpino's watch.

The Carpino and Kuhl appointments coincide with the timeline of the team's decline, but Arte's first notable hire proved he did not know how to find proper talent. Either way, on November 14th of 2009 this team was officially doomed from the top down with the farm being the first to suffer.

As far as affordability and fan experience...kind of?

I'll give Arte the benefit of the doubt on fan safety. Outside of the Freeway Series there are rarely fights in the stands and I feel perfectly safe taking my family to the Big A. But safety should be a given at a Major League ballpark. I also feel safe at Petco, Wrigley, even Dodgers Stadium is getting better now that fans need a second mortgage to buy tickets to games.

And this is Orange County, the land of suburbia and general safety. Is Arte really taking credit his team being in an area that ranks far below national average in violence and crime?

As far as average ticket prices, the Angels rank near the bottom in all of baseball. It is cheaper to see the Angels than it is to see most teams and promotions like the Family Fun Pack are really inexpensive. But there's a reason for that: per caps.

Per caps is short for "spending per capita" or how much each fan spends on the game. An empty seat generates a per cap of $0. However, if the team can get you in the door some way you will drop money on concessions and merchandise.

When demand is low, like for a losing team, low ticket prices get people in the door. So, essentially, Arte is taking credit for having a losing team that nobody wants to pay much to see.

Angels concessions are priced right around league average. A small beer might be cheaper at the Big A, but according to league wide numbers the cost of a hot dog, specialty beer, or higher end food item is no cheaper at the Big A than league average.

The big difference between the Angels and most stadiums is just how limited the food options are. Most stadiums nowadays offer a wide array for options that change over time. Lots of fans love the staples, but if you go to a dozen or more games at the Big A it is very easy to get tired of the same few options.

A lack of food options is one negative on the fan experience. The same goes for the antiquated bathrooms, lack of competitive teams, and generally unenthusiastic crowds.

However, this is offset by the fact the crowds are generally very family friendly, don't treat the game like life or death, and the beautiful sunset views available from most seats. So, the fan experience, like the concession prices, is simply average.

So what is Arte really giving Angels fans?

Obviously not a winner. But according to Arte we don't care about that. As long as the ballpark is safe and the tickets are priced just low enough to get us in to buy a $7 hot dog, we're happy.

About the only honest things he said today were that the lack of TV deal is impacting payroll and that he's not going to spend money to spend.

Guess why you don't have a TV deal, Arte? Do the Dodgers, Cubs, Yankees or Mets have that problem or do they win enough baseball games that networks are dying to broadcast their games? Your team plays in a huge market, as evidenced by the "Los Angeles" in front of the team name. Yet your team doesn't have a single network interested in airing your games.

Imagine in the late aughts looking at this team and thinking ownership and management would screw it up so badly they'd lose for a decade straight, waste six years of Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani in the same lineup, have the worst rated farm in all of baseball for years on end, and get to the point nobody even wants to televise the games.

The level of organizational failure is beyond astounding and completely unprecedented. Arte says he's not selling the team and that's actually the worst thing he said today. Because the day he's gone is the day Angels fans can have hope again.