Dodgers have 5th most loyal fans in MLB, per new ranking

How loyal are Los Angeles Dodgers fans?

If you are reading this blog, you’re probably a fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers. And who’s to say you aren’t one of the most loyal fans in all of baseball? Unless you just started rooting for the team yesterday, you’ve had a World Series title stolen from you by a team who cheats, and a championship has alluded you since 1988.

What does your loyalty count for? According to a new ranking by Forbes, Dodger fans are the fifth most loyal in baseball.

The ranking is based on a variety of metrics to assess fan commitment over the past three years, from television ratings to social media reach.

Of course, many Dodger supporters who live in the Los Angeles area have been unable to watch their favorite team on TV due to the ongoing dispute between SportsNet LA and local cable and satellite providers, which, ironically, found a partial resolution just before the season was paused due to the novel coronavirus.

Which fans were considered more loyal than Dodgers fans?

The Forbes list ranked the Boston Red Sox fans as the most loyal, followed by the Chicago Cubs; two historic franchises who spent nearly an entire century waiting for a modern World Series championship.

The St. Louis Cardinals ranked third and the New York Yankees ranked fourth.

Ranking fifth were the Dodgers, who the article noted have seen their attendance continue to finish near the top of the league despite increasing the average price of season ticket packages up to 90% over the past five years.

While Dodger fans continue to fill Dodger Stadium – the team has sold over 3 million tickets in 18 of the past 19 seasons – former player and local product Darryl Strawberry recently took a jab at the fanbase in comparing the intensity to New York (note: Mets fans didn’t make the top ten on Forbes’ list).

"“The fans are so different in New York than going to LA,” Strawberry recently said. “LA fans, they come late and leave early. New York fans come early, and never leave. That was the good thing about playing [in New York], they would wait until the end of the game, if you win or lose. And I was used to that.”"

Evaluating fan loyalty or passion is subjective, and everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but people outside of California often overlook the popularity of the Dodgers in Los Angeles.

Beyond television ratings and social media reach, Forbes used secondary ticket demand, merchandise sales, and hometown crowd reach (“defined by Nielsen as a percentage of the metropolitan area population that watched, attended and/or listened to a game in the last year“) to build their rankings.