Is the sports bubble about to pop? It’s probably too soon to tell, but that won’t stop me from reading the tea leaves.

Sports are all about omens. All it takes is for a baseball player to get called out a few times in a row and sportscasters will declare him to be “slumping” and that his team has “lost momentum.” (Either that or he’s “due.” Omens are funny that way.)

In recent weeks, the portents that many sports-watchers have been keeping an eye out for are predictions of how one of our other national obsessions — the spectator sport that is the roller-coaster economy — will affect teams’ bottom lines… [read more]