FanPulse Week 14: Why are Marlins fans more confident than Dodgers fans?

Want to influence the conversation? CLICK HERE to become a Giants FanPulse voter.

Last week, 50% of FanPulse voters were confident in the Giants’ direction and 90% of voters approved of Bruce Bochy’s work in his final season. This week, both percentages are down.

Just 44% are confident in the team and 82% approve of Bruce Bochy’s work. So it goes after another weird and rough week wherein the Dodgers pounded on the Giants for three straight games and the offense couldn’t muster up enough runs to complete a sweep in Arizona.

But it’s a new week and... well... hey — Madison Bumgarner has looked good, and was a key reason for the Giants’ sole win against the Rockies as well as the key factor in the Giants’ split against the Diamondbacks this past weekend, so maybe this week’s vote will show another uptick.

No, the Giants haven’t given their fans much of a reason to get excited about the team, but at the same time, it feels like they’ve been soberly assessed by FanPulse voters. In other vote total reviews, I’ve remarked at the large mood swings by some of the fan bases. Well, this week, let’s take a look at one that is super confident to the extent that I’m nearly speecheless.

Marlins voters have 95% confidence in their team’s direction. Just 73% of the voting body has confidence in Don Mattingly — still too high — but the flow of young talent and solid performance seems to have ignited hope within the base. This 95% matches their week 1 total. They were just 9-10 over the last three weeks of June, but five of those wins came against the Phillies, including a sweep, so maybe that’s it?

It hasn’t been a situation of supreme confidence all year long, either. They started the voting at 95%, then dropped to 86% in week two, and then hanging in the 70s the next four weeks, before dropping down to 66% confidence in week 7, then 58% in week 8. Then, in the past few weeks, they’ve been surging — the voters, I mean.

It’s great that the Miami FanPulse voters are feeling good about their young, inexperienced, and possibly ill-managed team, so instead let’s compare this young, inexperienced, and possibly ill-managed team with their exact opposite: the Los Angeles Dodgers, their success doppleganger.

Dodgers fans are just 85% confident in their team’s direction.

That team’s bullpen woes have really messed with the fan base. Seems like that’s something the team should address. On the other hand, the mission statement of every smart front office is “I’m smart enough to figure this out on my own.”

Anyway, here’s the full confidence chart:

Yeah, the Orioles’ 84% confidence is also another shocker. It seems, though, that FanPulse voters of the teams that were supposed to be good this year are the ones most dismayed by the results, while a lot of the teams that were supposed to be bad this year have understanding Online voters.

Voters from eight of the twelve teams with losing records have 50+% confidence in their team’s direction. Meanwhile, four of the 18 teams with winning or .500 records have sub-50% confidence in their direction.

So, 75% of the losing fan bases love what their team is doing, while 78% of winning fan bases are confident in the team’s direction; and, seven of the 17 teams with 75% or greater confidence have losing records. That’s a very odd setup. You’d think it’d be closer to 100% of the winning fan bases who’d have 50% or more confidence in their team’s direction.

Of course, some of these bad teams haven’t finished their roster purges just yet, so keep an eye on these results as we pass the trade deadline.