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Henry’s Random Thoughts
2012 Cincinnati Reds SGA Bobbleheads
May 12-Joey Votto Gold Glove Bobblehead
May 12 saw the Reds fall to
the suddenly-competent Nationals 2-1 in a game that was pretty much devoid of any
Reds highlights (the one RBI coming on a groundout). Still, the weather was
good and there was a much-hyped promo, so the place was packed. Never shy to
capitalize on the success of Joey Votto, the Reds
honored him with his third bobble in four years. This one was in honor of his
Gold Glove award. The team announced an allotment of 25,000 of them, 5,000 less
than what they said they were passing out last year and 15,000 fewer than the
numbers of a few years ago, a number large enough to satisfy almost everyone.
In addition, they held some back for those holding vouchers distributed to
those who bought multigame ticket packages.
The purpose of the voucher
was to reward the fan’s larger purchase by removing some uncertainty from his
quest. The fan with the voucher was to be directed to a special area where one
was held for him. Therefore, he would get one if he showed up after the main
supply was gone. The problem is, this made even fewer available to those
without vouchers. No one really knows how many vouchers were printed, but the
number left for the general public was probably still over 20,000. Now of
course, anyone dedicated enough to put this website up is going to be there
before they run out, so I got mine. But I have to say that 30 or 40 minutes
after they flung the gates open, supplies were significantly lower than at the
same point in prior years. You probably needed to be there an hour early to
have any hope at all.
Another interesting thing
about the voucher program is that if you showed up early with a voucher, they
just took your voucher and gave you one out of the main supply. I saw quite a
few people down there early with vouchers being processed this way. In advance,
they had to hold enough back to satisfy every voucher-holder, lest they get
caught with their pants down. What that tells me is that at the end of the
game, they had a stash of leftovers numbering several hundred or more. We will
never know what happens to these, but they will get distributed somehow.
The other change, of course,
had to do with the large contract extensions needed to secure the services of Votto and a couple of his teammates. While the extensions
were well-deserved, they had to be paid for somehow. One of the ways is that
the Reds have $5 upcharges on most of the weekend
games from May through August. Three of the four bobblehead
games have this upcharge. For the casual fan, it may
not matter much to cough up another $15 to get the full set, but for those who
might depend on Ebay sellers to complete their sets,
there will probably be fewer of those sellers this year. It can’t be overstated
how much the bobble reselling business model depends on a cheap ticket. The
days of 2001 when bobbles were a craze are over. There’s no more flipping a hot
bobble for $60 to $100. Most sellers are grinding it out hoping to make ten
bucks profit per doll on a good one and perhaps a few bucks on a bad one.
Perhaps the team made the
decision to discourage reselling. But as I’ve said before, the fan that trolls Ebay looking to complete his set is probably the type of
dedicated fan that the Reds want to keep, and it may be physically impossible
for that fan to claim each bobble at the stadium. Hopefully they bear that in
mind. In addition to some games being $5 more, there’s a $2 day-of-game upcharge to encourage fans to buy tickets in advance.
There’s not a whole lot to
say about the design of this one. It is made by Impact Promotions, and the
sponsor is the state lottery, which sponsored Dusty’s
bobble last year. The concept is the same as the Phillips Gold Glove one of a
few years back, with a fielding pose and the glove painted gold. The way he’s
straddling the bag is not quite like anything I’ve seen in a real game. I don’t
even think they take pickoff attempts that way. But to make all the elements
fit in such a confined space, I guess a little artistic license is in order.
As far as I know, 25,000 is
the number for each future bobblehead in 2012,
although I do not believe they will be messing with the voucher deal anymore.
This promotion was a lot more hyped than the others. They were running radio
ads specifically mentioning it as far back as December, which seemed a little
over-the-top to me.
June 23-Sean Casey Reds Hall of Fame Bobblehead
June 23 saw the Reds spank
the Twins 6-0 in front of a sellout crowd. Not all sellouts are created
equally, though, and if this one sold out completely, it was at the last
minute. Standing room tickets were there all week, so anyone wanting a cheap
bobble had a way of getting one that way. Of course, I mean relatively cheap,
since virtually all Saturday games this year have the $5 upcharge,
plus $2 more if you waited for game day. The days of getting a Saturday bobblehead plus admission for five bucks are a sweet, sweet
memory.
Prior to the game, the Reds
inducted the subject of the bobble, Sean Casey, into their Hall of Fame. For
those who missed the late nineties and early aughts,
Casey was a player whose popularity was so great that only sainthood could have
increased it any more. Not only was he an excellent hitter, he was about as fan
friendly as one could hope for. This bobble captures that friendliness with a
pose that involves a hat tip to all those adoring fans. It was sponsored by PNC
Bank. Usually, something like the batting helmet would be prone to breaking,
but knock on wood, I haven’t heard much about it busting off, unlike the arm
gizmo on last year’s Gomes. This item came in the biggest box I’ve ever seen
one come in, so perhaps that offered some protection to the item inside. The
one authentic touch I noticed was the shin guard Casey always wore at bat. The
Hall of Fame notation on the back of the base is a cheap sticker which was
placed a bit sloppily on some of them.
This was a 4:15 game, and
that changed the dynamic of the bobble distribution a little. They opened the
gates early in anticipation of pre-game ceremonies, but by the time we got down
there (two hours early), there were no lines and
plenty of stock at the gates. Anyone who got there early enough didn’t have to
worry about getting through multiple times before they ran out. It probably had
something to do with the game time. People who are in the middle of a busy
summer just aren’t going down to the park at 2:15. I’m not sure when they ran
out, but the simple math of the 25,000 announced distribution and the
attendance figure of over 40,000 meant that they ran out at some point. So
while the pressure is off a little on day games, don’t expect to get there at
the last minute if you want to walk out with the goods.
Reds fans remember that we
got Casey from the Indians for almost nothing, and in spite of the howling when
they traded him away, that trade was perfect because his production fell off
after he left, particularly in the area of hitting for power. The Reds really
got the best out of him. The only downside was that he was perhaps the
slowest-running star the Reds have had since the immortal-but-plodding Ernie
Lombardi. I can’t tell you how many times it frustrated me when he’d be on
second and they’d hold him at third on a single. But overall, Cincinnati was
much better off from having Casey around for those years.
July 18-Jay Bruce Bobblehead
July 18 saw the Reds fall
into a first place tie with the Pirates by losing to an average Arizona club
7-1. 26,000 fans witnessed the battle, 7,000 more than the mediocre crowd the
night before. This showed the effect that a bobblehead
promotion can have on attendance. This was the first weekday bobblehead in quite some time, so the stated number of
25,000 given out turned out to be ideal. Few, if any, fans who wanted one
should have gone home empty-handed.
A freak storm hit two hours
prior to game time, when bobble collectors would typically line up outside the
stadium. For obvious reasons, early lines were thin as the storm passed and a
light drizzle remained. As a general rule, if your bobble box gets wet and it
doesn’t totally disintegrate from the soaking, it dries out pretty well. If you
get multiple ones and collect them in a bag, just set them out separately as
soon as you get to a dry place. I’ve never seen the bobble itself suffer the
effects of bad weather.
This one is a fairly
standard batting pose, with the bat being packaged loose to be placed (not
screwed) into a hole at the top of his hands. The knob of the bat is part of
the hands. The base immortalizes the rallying cry heard when Bruce bats,
similar to when Mr. Springsteen takes the stage. It is sponsored by Chiquita, a
company with close ties to the Reds, dating back to when Carl Lindner had an
interest in both entities. What’s kind of funny is that the exclamation point
appears pretty comfortably on the one on the box, but they barely squeezed it
on the real base. I guess the one on the box was a prototype that was made a
little more carefully.
August 4-Johnny Cueto Bobblehead
August 4 found the Reds on a
tear that started before the All-Star break. They were in a battle for first with
the Pirates, who were in town for the weekend. Naturally, the Friday and
Saturday games were sellouts. The bobblehead game had
all of the standing room tickets sell out, as well. This was a game that few
people had on their calendar at the beginning of the year, so it turned out a
very tough ticket. If the giveaway count was accurate, about 17,000 to 18,000
left the building without a bobblehead. But the truth
is, a lot of them probably cared very little, as they
were there for the game. When the team is on a tear, the box office really
doesn’t need the boost that a good promotion provides, particularly on
weekends.
The bobble was the first
ever of Johnny Cueto, who established himself as the
staff ace last year, and continued to chalk up wins in 2012. Cueto is proving to be a poor man’s Pedro Martinez (with Edinson Volquez qualifying as a
homeless man’s Pedro). As he matures, he is getting his pitch counts down and
saving his hardest fastballs for when he really needs them. A successful career
could be in the making.
There’s nothing too gimmicky
about this one. It features Cueto in mid-windup,
dreadlocks flying. The beard he started sporting this year isn’t there, but as
I have said before, these items have to be ordered well in advance, so new styles
being sported by a particular player might not make it onto the bobble.
This item is sponsored by
Formica, a local company that makes flooring. There are many companies like
this in and around Cincinnati, so one would think that there are plenty of
future sponsors for bobbleheads. Still, over the
years the companies sponsoring them have become a bit less well-known over the
years. They started out sponsored by the kings of consumer marketing, the cola
companies. I believe it shows that the bobblehead
giveaway craze has matured. Perhaps they are moving back to what the teams
thought they would be when they started them around 2000. In other words, just
another promotion out of many and not something that stands out any more than
lawn flag giveaway or mesh jersey giveaway. But there are still hardcore
collectors out there. And the fact that the giveaways have been going on over a
decade means that there’s quite a set to collect for each team. My prediction
is that teams may try to keep shaving the number given away down, perhaps to
20,000 next year. But the teams’ marketing research may not be catching how
die-hard the small core of collectors are, and if they drop down to
ridiculously low numbers like the 5,000 the Twins tried to give away in 2000, there
are going to be some hard feelings.
Thus concludes 2012’s bobbleheads. There was no unifying theme, and three of the
four honorees had been featured before. It seems like they decided not to take
too many chances this year. But with Latos, Chapman
and Cozart not yet having been featured, there’s
plenty of new blood for next year. I’ve always been disappointed when the
all-time great is a repeat. There are so many untapped possibilities. My first
choice would be Ernie Lombardi, my grandma’s favorite player. Kluszewski would also be a fine choice. Seaver
would also be a good one. If anybody out there is listening, don’t dilly-dally
with Lombardi. Grandma isn’t going to live forever.