Major League Baseball enjoys winning season

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Despite intense talk of a potential indictment for Barry Bonds, the spread of human growth hormone and Alex Rodriguez's sore toe, Major League Baseball is quietly having one of its most successful economic seasons ever.

Attendance is at record levels. Revenues are up. And the league just signed a new television deal that could reap even bigger benefits down the road.

Consider: Last year's leaguewide attendance was the highest on record, and 18 out of 30 teams are on pace to have even higher attendance this season. Of the nine teams that have seen attendance drop this year, three are still drawing more than 38,000 fans a game, and only the Washington Nationals, Baltimore Orioles, Oakland Athletics and Florida Marlins have seen attendance drop by more than 10 percent.

Meanwhile, revenues from national television, radio and Internet deals have increased from $250 million to more than $800 million since 1999, and the league earns more than $30 million just from its contract with XM Satellite Radio.

"From a financial-health standpoint, I don't think they've ever been better," said Maury Brown, an author with Baseball Prospectus, who has written about the sport's economics. "They look very robust right now."

What's more, the league is having one of its most competitive seasons on record. Twenty of the league's 30 teams are within six games of a division or wild-card leader, and only one team -- the New York Mets -- has a commanding division lead.

"I would say from an industry perspective, the league is healthy," said Dave Dombrowski, general manager of the Detroit Tigers, who have the best record in baseball just three years after a 119-loss season. "You can easily say that the game is doing very well."

Mr. Dombrowski credits the league's expansion of revenue sharing after the 2002 season for helping the Tigers turn things around so quickly. The league splits all national broadcast and Internet revenue, and about 34 percent of a team's local revenue is shared.

"I feel very good about where we are," said MLB Commissioner Bud Selig during a roundtable discussion at this year's All-Star Game. "The sport today is more popular than it's ever been. We're going to set another attendance record this year. And I want to keep it that way."

It's quite a change from 2001, when Mr. Selig attempted to contract two franchises and testified before Congress that the league was losing more than $400 million.