Maeball game: Athletics vs Mariners  July 8, 2008 (game 2 of series)

The dorkiness starts here — it’s time for another round of Maeball!  This series’ match up is the Oakland Athletics vs the Seattle Mariners.  Man, remember last year when Joe Blanton got in a fist fight with the Mariners?  What a weird day.  I was sitting in section 217, grabbing onto my friend’s arm shouting, “Oh my god! Oh no!  Oh my God!” as it went on.

Right now, I’m in my kitchen, I’m listening to the A’s game on the radio as Duchscherer pitches the top of the 7th; Athletics 2, Mariners 0.  I’ll wait for another post to tell you about my dream last night where Rich Harden was playing for the Cubs in the World Series.  How I had texted my buddy in LA about it at 8am this morning, asking him what he thinks Beane is up to – man, what a day! 

This post, however, is all about marketing; and in that vain, I’m curious to see if all the money the Mariners have notoriously wasted away this year has had any affect on their online popularity.  Are people talking about them more online because of their losing season (18 games below 500, I believe – ouchie!)?  Or, is the A’s recent news of trading Harden and Gaudin for Sean Gallagher, Eric Patterson, and Matt Murton enough to raise traffic on sites discussing the Athletics?  What we’re comparing is the extended negative coverage of the Mariners this season and the sudden press the A’s have suddenly received from the Harden trade.

You know the drill: I’m comparing the Alexa rankings (the lower the ranking = the higher the site’s traffic) of the top sites from google web and blog searches.  Whoever has the lowest total ranking wins!

Seatttle Mariner’s Alexa rankings of top Google Web Search:
1.) mariners.mlb.com    #206
2.) mariners.mlb.com    #206
3.) wiki.org    #8
    NewsResults
        1.) freep.com     #3,732
        2.) ap.google.com    #2
        3.) canadianpress.google.com   #2
4.) seattletimes.nwsource.com    #1,085
5.) baseball-almanac.com    #34,447
6.) sportsillustrated.cnn.com    #52
7.) seattlepi.nwsource.com    #1,085
8.) yahoo.com        #1
9.) blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com    #33,913

Total:1117,232

Oakland Athletics’ Alexa rankings of top Google Web Search
1)  athletics.mlb    #206
2)  athletics.mlb    #206
3)  wikipedia.org    #8
    NewsResults
        1.)sportsnetwork.com    #12,883
        2.)bloomberg.com    #657
        3.)canadianpress.google.com    #2
4.) espn.go.com    #61
5.) nytimes.com    #206
6.) sportsline.com    #562
7.) cnn.com    #52
8.) sfgate.com    #861
9.) athleticsnation.com    #149,734

Total: 165.019

Mariners win…but…

Holy Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!  Duchscherer just pitched a full shut out game in 1 hour and 49 minutes with just two hits from the Mariners.  He’s got an ERA of 1.78!!!!!!!

Duchscherer, American League All Star steals the show from Harden’s trade but not from Seattle’s bad press.  Mariners win in San Francisco by a 47,787Alexa ranking, but lose in Oakland by 2 runs.

Both teams need to invest get more mlb domains (ie oakland.athletics.mlb.com, and athletics.mlb.com).  I don’t know how of if that’s possible, but that’s what they need.  More domains and content mean more traffic views.

Seattle needs to put more content into nwsource.com, freep.com, and thebaseball-almanac.com.  The Athletics need to  work on the Sports Network and Athletics Nation.  Athletics Nations has once again become an awesome blog with posts titled: We’re Not as Rich Now, But We Still Have Duke posted by Nico.  It’s good to see a site with such potential writing great posts.

So, what is have here is C.C. Sabathia, featured in Bay Area car commercials, playing with the Milwaukee Brewers going up against Rich Harden and the Cubs for the National League’s Central title.  How does this affect the Athletics’ road to the American League’s West playoffs?  I’d love to hear what you think.

I didn’t get to blogs today – maybe tomorrow evening.