LOS ANGELES — The MLB All-Star experience is a money-making machine.
One estimate given to KING 5 indicated anywhere between $50 and $100 million in revenue generated for the city of Los Angeles.
It's thanks to experiences like Fan Fest, the Santa Monica Pier oceanfront, the Home Run Derby and the All-Star Game itself.
"We're going to eclipse last year's total today, only two days into Fan Fest when it was a five-day event last year," an employee working a Rawlings booth at Fan Fest said.
Will the same cash flow come to Seattle in 2023?
Jay Tucker thinks it will.
“Done properly, the experience in Seattle should be really unique. It should be spectacular,” he said.
Tucker works at UCLA at the Anderson School of Management and runs their Center for Media, Entertainment and Sports.
He lived in Seattle in the early 1990s.
“The thing that’s really special about Seattle is that T-Mobile (Park) is right there in Pioneer Square," he said. "It’s very easy to get to in a variety of modalities, it’s very close to the waterfront, lots of bars, incredible music, and so on.”
Seattle has the setting, and also the star to go with it.
“We’ll be at the Home Run Derby tomorrow rooting on Julio,” Brien Stevenson said ahead of Monday's event.
Stevenson said his family also plans on going to next year's game.
“The Mariners home field vibes it’s gonna be awesome,” he said.
They may be living in southern California, but they root for the Mariners.
Tucker says it's folks like these that will help Seattle make the most of its All-Star experience.
“When you have the premier event, a once-in-a-lifetime event like an All-Star Game, it does attract people from larger metropolitan regions and the faraway places and that changes the kinds of experiences that people will engage in and how much money they’re prepared to spend,” he said. “Fandom in Seattle has grown since Griffey years. It's time for that market to have another All-Star Game."