[Vampyr]

LOL sorry to disappoint those who thought this thread was going to be about sports.

I am wondering about Yankees caps. It seems that whenever I see someone wearing a cap with a MLB logo on it it is the Yankees. I realise that the Yankees are an iconic and near-legendary team, but does that mean that everyone in England who cares about baseball is a Yankees fan?

Also, I just learnt that when the cap is sold not in a Yankees outlet, the proceeds have to be shared with all of the other teams. That seems a little unfair. But then again, the Yankees are probably the richest team in MLB, so perhaps it is fair just because it happens to be their caps that everyone is buying.

[ggwhiz]

I thought they were Neil Young hats.

[Vampyr]

ggwhiz, on 2016-August-29, 14:03, said:

I thought they were Neil Young hats.

All Neil Young fans? Um, even more unlikely

[billw55]

My guess would be that (almost) nobody in England cares about baseball, and that the Yankees hat is just a common souvenir from USA.

Yes, over here our sports leagues have something called revenue sharing. The details vary between the four major sports, but the general gist is that some revenue streams are distributed among all teams, so that the teams that are from smaller markets (or less rich for some other reason) have enough funds to compete with the teams from large markets (or more rich for some other reason).

It is usually assumed that what we call parity is a noble goal, i.e. many teams having a good chance to win. This doesn't seem to be a thing with European leagues, as La Liga, Bundesliga, etc are dominated by the same teams year in year out and nobody seems to consider it a problem. I would have said EPL also until last year happened.

[Cyberyeti]

If you ask people who know very little about baseball to name one team, I suspect the Yankees would be the top pick, much like Manchester United were the only football team anybody knew about abroad long before the days that English football was everywhere, probably due to Munich.

[Vampyr]

billw55, on 2016-August-29, 14:32, said:

My guess would be that (almost) nobody in England cares about baseball, and that the Yankees hat is just a common souvenir from USA.

No, they are sold here, and i see them almost daily anyway, ao,there is no way that many people went to New York and picked up that particular souvenir.

Yeah, I was thinking of a parallel with Man United, but i don't think that Man United jerseys were sold in every third shop like Yankee caps are here.

[mgoetze]

I see them here in Germany quite a bit too, I always assume people associate it with New York, not with baseball.

[billw55]

Vampyr, on 2016-August-29, 23:03, said:

No, they are sold here, and i see them almost daily anyway, ao,there is no way that many people went to New York and picked up that particular souvenir.

Yeah, I was thinking of a parallel with Man United, but i don't think that Man United jerseys were sold in every third shop like Yankee caps are here.

OK, so not necessarily a souvenir from actually going to USA, but something that people buy because they think it represents the USA, or New York specifically as mgoetze says. I am still not convinced it has much to do with actual baseball.

Similar around here, merchandise from European football leagues is mostly limited to the top teams. I want a Crystal Palace hat.

[jjbrr]

billw55, on 2016-August-30, 06:33, said:

OK, so not necessarily a souvenir from actually going to USA, but something that people buy because they think it represents the USA

this to me is obviously right. just like red solo cups.