Around this time of the year, I write a post to celebrate the arrival of baseball, the national pastime. This year the pastime has not arrived on time; it may not arrive at all.
Its absence is far from the saddest story of Covid-19–though sad enough for the unemployed beer vendors, ticket-takers, and security guards, as well as the hot prospects who were going to break into the big leagues this year and the fading veterans who were going to resurrect their careers for just one more turn. Yet, true fans still yearn. We read the latest stories that baseball writers have scrounged from the recycle bins of their laptops, such as features on the best second-string left fielders who played on the teams west of Mississippi in 1977 or on the meals that the local team’s bullpen catcher is whipping up for his kids during confinement. Meanwhile, TV provides reruns of games that local nine never lose. 
What will MLB do with the season? One idea being pitched and batted around, semi-endorsed by Dr. Anthony Fauci himself, is to play the games in stadiums scattered in a restricted locale–the Phoenix region is often mentioned–with the players effectively quarantined together (think of a cruise ship berthed in Scottsdale) and no fans in the stands, just tv cameras. What would baseball be like without the fans?
Athletes almost always publicly credit the fans, calling them the 6th man in basketball, the 10th man in baseball, the 12th man in football–really, the 6th, 10th, 12th person. Winning teams thank their fans for the support without which victory would have been impossible, losing teams praise them for their faith and loyalty through hard times. But, do fans really matter (besides paying the fare)?
I did a quick literature search on the topic.
Home Advantage
Home teams win more often than do visiting teams, although that is least true for baseball among the top team sports. It happens 55% of the time, worth about 4 extra wins a season. (For soccer it is 67%.) Fans tend to think that the home team edge is because of fans: they spur the home team to better performance and harass the visitors into worse performance.
But researchers are skeptical. They have focused on four major explanations for home field advantage: The fatigue of traveling; visitors’ unfamiliarity with the field (especially important in baseball where fields can be so different–say the Green Monster in Fenway, Triples Alley in Oracle, and the wind conditions in Wrigley); differential performance by the players, as the fans’ theory suggests; and favorable referee or umpire calls. Baseball is also distinct in that batting last would seem to confer a strategic advantage to the home team, but that does not seem to matter.
The most important factor, it appears, is referee or umpire judgment. For baseball, in particular, home teams get the benefit of the doubt on close ball and strike calls. One estimate is that the home-visitor difference in those calls accounts for 70% of the home field advantage. (Other sports: soccer; basketball and football.) Travel fatigue may matter a bit, on-field performance a bit, and field familiarity a bit, especially for really distinct venues like mile-high Coors Field. One might imagine that professional athletes, who have played since childhood in front of both friendly and hostile crowds and who are, after all, performing their jobs, would not be heavily influenced, no matter what they say. Yet, umpires are. Umps could lean ever so slightly toward the home team for various reasons, but researchers assume it’s unconscious conformity to the crowd. If so, presumably, the bigger the crowd, the bigger the push.
One analysis calculates that going from a half-filled stadium to a three-quarters-filled stadium increases the chances of the home team winning by over 5 percent, basically accounting for the home advantage; it also adds about one more home-team home run a week. Another analysis suggests that a big crowd adds 2 or 3 victories a season over a small crowd.
What does this imply for 2020 baseball without fans? We should expect a very small, if any, home advantage.
But what about the quality of play itself? “You don’t realize the little bit of oomph, the little extra effort, the focus you get when you’ve got fans in the stands,” said one sidelined player. I haven’t found a study of whether fans add a couple of miles to a fastball or more torque to a swing. I’m sure that’s coming
I close with a picture of Willie Mays. Why? Why not? A leading baseball writer for The Athletic recently did a countdown of the 100 greatest baseball players of all time. Willie was, of course, number 1. (BTW, the outfield stands seem to be empty; no matter.)
