At the time I’m writing this, the Braves are 19-46, indisputably the worst team in Major League Baseball. They are an abysmal 8-27 at home, appropriately sending Turner Field off in a similar manner in which they negotiated the development of ScumTrust Park: pathetically.
Although Freddie Freeman just hit for the cycle, which just might be the highest point for the team as a whole all year, the Braves have been predictably putrid in just about every single facet of the game. Forget things like hitting with runners in scoring position or pitching with inherited runners; the Braves as a team can’t hit and they can’t pitch.
They’re on a pace to challenge history, as in the 1969 Mets that lost 120 games, a record that still stands to this day. I originally pegged the Braves as a 100-loss team, which is what I did last year, only to fall short much to my disappointment, but this season, it seems not only all but a sure bet, but just how many games over 100 are they going to lose?
So with so much literal shit in place, it’s been difficult trying to identify where it is the Braves will have hit rock bottom; because for so many, it isn’t until a person, a team, or an entity has hit rock bottom can really the road to recover actually begin.
I’m officially throwing in this development as a legitimate candidate for being rock bottom: the Atlanta Braves Monthly Pass. In short, it’s a plan where fans pay $39 per month for the remainder of the season, and they will have admission to every single home game for that month. It’s an absolute steal, considering that if you do the math, for full months like July, August and September, tickets would be roughly rendered down to just under $3 a game.
The absolute cheapest season ticket plan still results in around $3.70 per ticket, for a fixed seat in one of the less-desirable sections of the upper deck. But with the Monthly Pass, your seat is decided on the day of the game, and considering the fact that the Braves are averaging like 50 people a game, I would hypothesize that there’s good chance to occasionally get some not-as-less-desirable seats from time-to-time.
Bottom line is that the introduction of the Monthly Pass is a definite sign of desperation for any sort of profit, and a plea for people to come to the park, where they would ostensibly spend money on expensive parking, expensive ballpark concessions, and soon-to-be-if-not-already-reduced-cost merchandise.
The funny thing is that the Braves can’t even do stuff like this without pissing off fans; namely the ones who have paid substantially more than $3 a ticket for season ticket packages that required deposits, getting inundated by marketers and invasive payment information. Imagine having spent $500 to own 41 games in section 405 row 7, and then finding out that some jabroni plunked down $39 and is going to sit two rows in front of you throughout the entire month of August? Yeah, maybe not as funny to them, as it is to me.
Make no mistake, this promotion is an absolute steal, for those who like casual attending, and don’t really care about seeing the Braves having a 23% chance of winning. But what it symbolizes from a reputable franchise with a proud history and lineage of moderate success, is a truly sad, sad sight, and could actually be a genuine rock bottom moment in what’s already a rock bottom season.
