{"id":589463,"date":"2026-04-06T16:40:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T16:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/589463\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T16:40:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T16:40:12","slug":"mlb-teams-are-investing-in-creative-ways-to-attract-new-fans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/589463\/","title":{"rendered":"MLB Teams Are Investing IN Creative Ways To Attract New Fans"},"content":{"rendered":"

Major League Baseball<\/a>\u00a0is in a great spot, but it could be heading toward a work stoppage once the season is over. MLB<\/a> saw the most viewers for Game 1 of the 2025 World Series, averaging\u00a032.6 million combined viewers<\/a>\u00a0across the United States, Canada, and Japan, the most since Game 7 of the 2016 World Series.<\/p>\n

Despite the potential of a work stoppage in 2027, teams are doing what they can to reach new fans. One way that teams have been trying to attract new fans is by investing in content creation.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

MLB teams are investing in internal creative studios\"Apr<\/p>\n

Apr 1, 2026; Seattle, Washington, USA; Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh (29) hits a RBI single against the New York Yankees during the eighth inning at T-Mobile Park. Mandatory Credit: Steven Bisig-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

The Seattle Mariners<\/a> have invested in an internal creative studio to attract more fans. The Mariners released shorts (commercials) throughout spring training to promote the team online.<\/p>\n

One short had All-Star catcher Cal Raleigh dress as a fictional character, \u201cHal Baleigh.” The Mariners were inspired by a similar gag done 14 years ago by Mariners legend right-hander Felix Hernandez. Hernandez portrayed a character named \u201cLarry Bernandez.\u201d<\/p>\n

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According to Dan LaTorraca, Marketing Director for Zoomph (a sponsorship performance platform), paid media campaigns are not the way to bring in new fans, but more \u201corganic content\u201d will.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny of these [MLB] teams could\u2019ve reached the same size audience with paid media campaigns, but reach does not create fandom,\u201d LaTorraca said to\u00a0Mike Mazzeo of Sports Business Journal<\/a>. \u201cOrganic content like this builds a deeper connection with fans, humanizes players and creates a sense of pride while building excitement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

The Los Angeles Dodgers<\/a> generated $101 million in social media value in 2025 and had over 2.51 billion impressions and 122 million engagements, per Sports Business Journal. Zoomph defines social value as \u201cthe total estimated media value of a social post, based on impressions, video views and engagements, which represents the equivalent cost required to reach the same audience through paid advertising.\u201d<\/p>\n

This story was originally published by Athlon Sports<\/a> on Apr 6, 2026, where it first appeared in the MLB<\/a> section. Add Athlon Sports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Major League Baseball\u00a0is in a great spot, but it could be heading toward a work stoppage once the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":589464,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,6099,47883,1187,5882,591,2704,5142,5162,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-589463","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cal-raleigh","11":"tag-felix-hernandez","12":"tag-los-angeles-dodgers","13":"tag-major-league-baseball","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-new-york-yankees","16":"tag-seattle","17":"tag-seattle-mariners","18":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=589463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/589464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=589463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=589463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=589463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}