Tampa Bay Rays Attendance

13k is pathetic though. No doubt about it. It may be expected, but that doesn’t make it forgiveable. This team should not be drawing 13k any night of the week. This area does have a lot of “BJ Upton” type lazy people that don’t want to drive more than 20 mins. We also have tons of “fans” that are a combination of bandwagon, new, or roots for other teams. Thats just how it is right now. Hopefully the market will improve.

Also it is retarded to compare the Rays Monday game to the Royals Monday game. The Royals played a better drawing opponent. The Royals are also in 1st place and riding a hot streak. The Royals also started the best pitcher in MLB (my pre-season CY Young winner) who is seemingly throwing CG-SOs every time out. The Rays on the other hand aren’t playing great ball although they have the talent to win it all. And we were throwing a suddenly soft tossing 90 mph fastball lefty that walks a zillion batters. Huge difference.

Hey Sports Chief (snicker). Maybe instead of worrying about our fanbase attendance you should be worried about your Yankmes. Is it a coincidence that they brought A-Rod back against the LAST PLACE Orioles and not against us. Why is the highest priced team not able to beat the lowest priced team in the Al East. Heart that’s why. If you buy a high priced hooker (YANKMES) you don’t get love and that is what the players of the (Yankmes) are. The hooker doesn’t give you her heart no matter how much you pay. No matter how much you love that hooker, no matter how pretty she may be she is still just doing a job and that is it. Don’t think so Just look at Damon. Mr. Die hard Sox man he was until the Yankmes waved money and just like any good hooker he was gone. A-Rod just happens to have his best season before his contract is up. Yup just another hooker. Almost all the Yankees were somebody elses bitch before they put on the pinstripes. So sports chump next time you put on your favorite Yankmes jersey look over at your wife and ask yourself is my wife a Yankme fan and if so was she someone elses bitch.

People are talking about bandwagon fans. How the f__k does a newer team get fans without bandwagon fans. If the team plays well consistently those bandwagon fans become true diehard fans. My in-laws are die hard mets fans because one day his boss gave him a free pair of tickets to a game. He was a Brooklyn fan who felt abandoned. Fifty years later even his grand kids are die-hard Mets fans. I was a mets fan but having grown up in and loving Florida I felt it my duty to always root for my Florida teams. When I move to Florida in 1973 as a 8 year old kid I stopped rooting for the Jets and started rooting for the Dolphins. I was a kid it did not matter to me that the Dolphins were playing there best football ever. It only mattered that they were my home state team so three years later my hometown gets there own team (Buccaneers) and I have followed them religously ever since . This will also happen to the Rays it just takes time. Bandwagon fans still buy tickets. Last year some bandwagon fan jumped on the Rays and still is a Rays fan hoping they make good on the promise shown last year. Me being a Buccaneer fan it doesn’t matter if the Rays win or lose cause I have seen the worst and the best and survived both. In 1976 I became a Buc in , 1992 Lightning fan and 1996 a (Devil) Rays fan. The Rays move and I will go back to the Marlins.

There are two areas you need to look at regarding Rays attendance for home games in 2009. One is that the overall average number of fans at the game for 13 home games is 15th in MLB, exactly in the middle of the pack.

But the other way to look at it is the percentage of seats filled for the 13 Rays games played so far. 60.3% of tickets for the games have been sold and that is also 15th best in all of baseball.

I think after 2008, the Rays are behind where most people would have thought they would be in terms of attendance, but it’s much better than the years and years of being last or close to last and having a sea of blue seats during a home game.

In regard to the May 4th game, I was there and must say I was disappointed in the crowd’s size. Having just taken 3 of 4 from Boston and showing signs of getting things rolling, to have a crowd of 12,658 (35.1%) show up is not a good sign. One would figure the numbers would be higher to start the year. With NY in town and all the giveaways and fan fare, it was sure to draw people out, the White Sox are a fairly decent draw and of course Boston is always going to be a big draw as well.

The Rays are 15-18, play two in Baltimore and then head home for 8 games (4 with CLE, 4 with OAK). We are now into the part of the schedule where it will show whether fans who dashed out last fall and got Rayhawks, got Cowbells, and caught Rays fever are still serious about supporting the team or will just play wait and see the way they did last May, June, July, August and part of September.

Come on out, folks, it’s still fun this time of year to go to a ball game. Go Rays, and I’ll see you there Thursday night.