Not that anyone cares...MLB Jersey pricing, one man's wasted hour.
I was looking at Detroit Tigers jerseys, thinking it might be time to replace the Higginson jersey that my brother gave me almost 10 years ago (I'm pretty sure it was shortly after they signed him to that anchor of a contract). Anyway, I was initially shocked that the road jersey costs $75 more than the home jersey. Some back and forth on Twitter ( w/ @akosnitzky ) about economics, supply & demand, and inventory levels got me wondering about the other 29 teams. Was there any rhyme or reason to pricing? Home v. Away; Good team v. Bad team; Big Market v. Small Market; Popular v. Unpopular?
So, because I'm lame like that and don't know how to best use my time, I gathered all the data for the list below:
Team
Home
Away Notes Angels $244.99 $224.99 All-Star Patch A's $194.99 $194.99 Blue Jays $199.99 $274.99 Indians $244.99 $244.99 Mariners $234.99 $269.99 Orioles $204.99 $214.99 Cool Base Rangers $294.99 $294.99 Cool Base Rays $274.99 $274.99 Red Sox $184.99 $209.99 Royals $214.99 $219.99 Cool Base Tigers $184.99 $259.99 Twins $244.99 $244.99 50th Anniv. / Inaugural Year Stadium White Sox $184.99 $194.99 Yankees $174.99 $194.99 Astros $234.99 $244.99 45th Anniversary Braves $209.99 $209.99 Brewers $244.99 $244.99 Cardinals $254.99 $254.99 Cubs $179.99 $199.99 D'Backs $219.99 $219.99 Dodgers $199.99 $199.99 1955 WS 55th Anniversary Giants $199.99 $214.99 Marlins $274.99 $294.99 Mets $264.99 $254.99 Cool Base Nationals $264.99 $234.99 Cool Base Padres $264.99 $234.99 Cool Base Phillies $199.99 $184.99 Pirates $209.99 $214.99 Cool Base Reds $219.99 $214.99 Rockies $249.99 $249.99
"Cool Base" is the new "mesh-like" panels in the under-arm, in theory to increase ventilation and help keep cool on hotter days (I think).
The average price for a home jersey is $225.99, and a road jersey is $233.16 (for consistency's sake, let's say $232.99).
I have no idea if pricing is set by individual teams or by MLB. Every team uses the exact same web storefront, but my guess is that teams set their own pricing. It looks like the teams you'd assume to be most popular (high demand?) tend to have the lower prices. Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs, Phillies, Dodgers, Giants, White Sox. I'm sure there's an economic term to explain when (seemingly) high demand actually means lower prices, although I don't know what it is.
There are six teams with a combined home/road price over $500: Seattle, Texas, Tampa Bay, St. Louis, New York (Mets), and Washington. That group is all over the map in terms of good/bad/popular/unpopular/big market/small market, and I'm not economist enough to explain why. There are seven teams where the combined total is under $400 (the six "popular" teams plus Oakland).
So there. I've basically wasted an hour or so of my evening satisfying my curiosity about something that's about as unimportant as you can get.
Posted via web from Dann's posterous