A day after Easter comes an unofficial holiday on the calendar — baseball’s Opening Day — not that the majority of New Yorkers care.
According to a Siena College poll, many New Yorkers are passing on the National Pastime. A March telephone survey of 804 residents revealed that only 36 percent of New Yorkers — 46 percent of men and 27 percent of women — identify themselves as baseball fans.
Only 35 percent of upstate residents identified themselves as fans, compared to 42 percent in New York suburbs.
A more troubling statistic in a state that calls two major league teams and the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum home: Only one in four New Yorkers ages 18-34 said they were baseball fans.
Among income demographics, those making $100,000 or more were most likely to be baseball fans (45 percent), while those making $50,000 to $100,000 were least likely (29 percent). Latinos (41 percent) were more likely to be fans than whites (40 percent) or African Americans (33 percent).
Going into the season, more New Yorkers are optimistic about the New York Yankees than the New York Mets making the postseason: 59 percent believe the Yankees are more likely to make the playoffs, compared to 18 percent for the Mets. (One percent volunteered both, while 4 percent believed neither.) Among baseball fans, rooters of the Yankees outnumbered the Mets two-to-one (60 percent to 30 percent).
The poll by the Siena Research Institute had a four-point margin of error.
Categories: -Sports-, Schenectady County
