One thing you can count on is that stadium attendance for the Yankees will never go down no matter how bad the economy gets. This ain't San Diego, this is the New York Yankees who make gobs of money and then put it right back into the team. Fan loyalty will never be in question because NY'ers recognize that the Yankees are committed to giving their fans the best baseball experience you can get in this country. No one even comes close and as a Yankee fan I love it!

Really? Did you look at the attendance figured of the 80's and early 90's? They weren't selling out every game back then like they are now. No one can say for certain what's going to happen in the future, so to say that they're attendance will never go down is quite naive.

Stadium attendance is highly correlated with winning. If the Yankees start to dominate the standings again with the new crop of free agent signings, then they will draw fans, making the expenditure on the free agents self-financing.
Just win, baby! and it all falls into place.

As long as the Yankees put a competitive team out there, they'll draw. The 80s & early 90s had some pretty bad teams out there (same with late 60s)

Aren't the Mets corporate owned? Corporations will do things differently from a family owned business.

Still, with a declining economy, people may go, they just won't buy souveniers or beer or hotdogs. Maybe a coke, and sneak in some rum.

You would think Cerrone would realize that the Yankees have so much more capital it's ridiculous. For one, they bring more fans into the stadium....both home and away, so their daily cuts add up to much larger. Two, and I think this is huge, their merchandising is much, much larger. I'm in NY and there is clearly more Yankees hats than Mets hat. And if you move away from NY I bet the ratio is 10 times as lopsided, not to mention they have an overseas market to sell to as well, they basically own the japan market. They have had their network much longer, adding up those revenue, which take a while to add up. I may be wrong about this one, but don't they have far more non yankee related money? And finally, they didn't lose half their cash to Madoff as Wilpon did.

This article from CNBC offers a good explanation, I think, for why the Yanks can spend so much when the Mets can't:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/28370215

Bottom line: The Steinbrenner's main business is the Yankees. Most other owners have other businesses they need to worry about in addition to their team. When the economy tanks, those other businesses take a hit and they can't afford to invest back into their team. When your primary business IS baseball, your only priority is to worry how well your team does.

The Mets are not corporate owned. They are owned by the Wilpon family.

I understand nobody can come close to matching the amount of money they put back into the team, but there are certainly teams who put the same amount of their money back into the team. Of course other teams try as hard, and they do it better. I'm willing to bet those red sox fans get the same effort from their guys even though their revenue sources are limited by a tiny stadium.

And to say they get the best experience is a bit off, maybe they get the most money spent, but that leaves you guys with the Giambi's, Browns, Pavano's, R. Johnson's, Lieber's, Igawa's of the world. It also left you for years, unecessarily, with a stadium that while beloved (i'm a met fan who loved it) was far inferior to a majority of stadiums.

Ahh Metsblog, the home of deep questions and delusion Mets fans. Maybe Matt could suggest a cool trade, like Luis Castillo for Chase Utley or Carlos Delgado for Albert Pujols...

My goodness, the Mets have David Wright, Carlos Beltran, Johan Santana, Jose Reyes all locked up for years to come. This winter Minaya (a.k.a. My GM Skills Are Lauded Because My Team HAS MONEY!) went and got Fingers to the Sky Squating Dancing Queen and Pootz. What more does Cerrone want? How about a really expensive stadium from taxpayers? Oh, got that one too.

The Mets are the Mets and the Yankees are the Yankees. I've never lived in New York and can understand this. (Not that I ever pull for the Yankees...I can't stand 'em.)

The demand drivers just aren't the same - longer history I guess for the Yankees, more sustained success?

But the most expensive seats for new Yankee Stadium are $2500 a game, for Citifield $500.

Another example, for essentially the same seats at nYS and Citi, behind the plate top deck, first 4 rows, the cheapest Yankee plan is $8100 a ticket*, for the Mets $2400 a ticket - for a baseball fan rather than a Yanks or Mets fan, the choice was easy for me.

* Yankees have taken away the half season / weekday option - full season or you are not committed enough! Mets still offer these seats for every other game.

I am genuinely interested in how the downturn impacts the Yankees revenue stream - every Yankee fan seems absolutely certain that the revenues are certain - kind of like employees at Bear Stearns, Lehman et al prior to the last year?

"No one can say for certain what's going to happen in the future, so to say that they're attendance will never go down is quite naive."

Naive? No, foolish. Wonder when Congress gets around to holding hearings on TARP funds getting spent on luxury boxes. Yankees will take a beating on tickets in 2010.