Angi: Ever wondered how players do on their bobblehead nights?
From SABR member Cee Angi at Baseball Nation on May 15, 2013:
Bobbleheads aren’t anything new. The first bobbleheads date back to Germany in 1852, and the first sports bobblehead surfaced in the 1920s, a generic basketball player for the New York Knicks. In baseball, interest in the collectible was sparked in the 1960s with figures of Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Willie Mays, and Roberto Clemente. The current bobblehead obsession started in 1999, when the San Francisco Giants revived the tradition with a Willie Mays bobblehead promotion.
In the years that followed, some teams would offer a bobblehead or two a season, but the number has continued to escalate: since 2010 there have been 334 bobblehead promotional giveaways at major league parks. These promotions have been a great way for teams to incentivize attendance; Paul Konerko and Harold Baines Bobblehead Nights have been the highest-attended White Sox games of the season (Opening Day excluded), and that’s an effect that’s felt around the league. There’s only one team that hasn’t done a Bobblehead promotion since 2010, and that’s the Boston Red Sox. In their history, they’ve offered just one: Nomar Garciaparra in 2002. The Giants, the organization that resurrected the craze, have done the most promotions since 2010: 34 in that span, 77 total since 1999.
The unexplored question about bobbleheads doesn’t relate to the history or the business. It was asked of me while we were sitting in the stands on Saturday, following a Konerko single to right field: “Ever wonder how players do on their Bobblehead Day?”
Read the full article here: http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2013/5/15/4333492/paul-konerko-bobble-head-white-sox
Originally published: May 15, 2013. Last Updated: May 15, 2013.