The New York Yankees Remain the Country’s Most Popular Baseball Team Three Years in a Row, According to New Harris Poll

As we head into the last month of regular season play, the New York Yankees find themselves again on top as the country’s favorite baseball team. The Atlanta Braves move up one spot to #2 on the list, while the Chicago Cubs slip down a spot to #3 according to the results of a nationwide Harris Poll of 874 U.S. adults who follow Major League Baseball. The poll was conducted online by Harris Interactive^® between July 12 and 18, 2005.

Following the Yankees, Braves and Cubs, rounding out the top five are the Boston Red Sox (#4) and the New York Mets (#5). With the World Series title now behind them and the curse broken, the Red Sox position has remained unchanged. The New York Mets, on the other hand, show a surprising jump up from #14 last year to the top five this year.

Three teams have moved up nine or more places since 2004:

• The Chicago White Sox move up 17 places from #27 to #10
• The Cincinnati Reds move up 11 places from #19 to #8; and
• The New York Mets move up nine places from #14 to #5.

Three teams have dropped eight or more places since last year:

• The Detroit Tigers have fallen 14 places from #5 to tied for #19
• The Cleveland Indians have fallen 10 places from #9 to tied for #19; and
• The Houston Astros have fallen eight points from #9 to #17.

This latest survey also looked at baseball expansion. This year’s "new" team, the Washington Nationals, is ranked #22, a large improvement over the ranking of the old Montreal Expos (#30 in 2004). Also, when asked which city should receive a baseball team if Major League Baseball were to expand the league, one-third (33%) of those who follow baseball say it should expand to Las Vegas, Nev. while 21 percent say it should expand to Charlotte, N.C., Portland, Ore. was the pick for 14 percent, seven percent said the team should go to Orlando, Fla., four percent chose Hartford, Conn. and four percent think Sacramento, Calif. should receive the expansion team. Less than one in five (17%) said they would choose none of these cities.

"What is your favorite Major League Baseball team?"

Base: Follow Major League Baseball

*While the name may have changed, since it is the same team, we have kept the trend from previous years.

**It should be noted that the sample was limited to the United States. It is therefore no surprise that the Canadian team placed last on this list in a survey where no Canadian residents are surveyed.

"Recently, Major League Baseball moved the Montreal Expos to Washington, DC. If Major League Baseball was to expand the league, which one of these cities should receive a baseball team?"

Base: Follow baseball

Methodology
The Harris Poll^® was conducted online within the United States between July 12 and 18, 2005 among a nationwide cross section of 2,339 adults (aged 18 and over), of whom 874 follow Major League Baseball. Figures for age, sex, race, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.

Though this online sample is not a probability sample, in theory, with probability samples of this size, one could say with 95 percent certainty that the overall results have a sampling error of plus or minus 2 percentage points of what they would be if the entire U.S. adult population had been polled with complete accuracy. Sampling error for the sub-sample results of those who follow Major League Baseball is plus or minus 3 percentage points. Unfortunately, there are several other possible sources of error in all polls or surveys that are probably more serious than theoretical calculations of sampling error. They include refusals to be interviewed (nonresponse), question wording and question order, and weighting. It is impossible to quantify the errors that may result from these factors.

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