Worst Opening Night crowd in over ten years
DMZ · April 3, 2006 at 7:37 pm · Filed Under Mariners
1995 - 34,656
1996 – 57,467
1997 – 57,586
1998 – 57,822
1999 – 51,656
2000 – 45,552
2001 – 45,911
2002 – 46,036
2003 – 45,931
2004 – 46,142
2005 – 46,249
2006 – 45,515
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Be afraid, Ms owners (and fans). Be very afraid.
It’s only 40 under 2000.
2000 Opening Day came off of two sub-80 win seasons and was the first OD in the new park. 2006 has two sub-70 win seasons in the same park with the novelty worn off of it.
So, “worst in over ten years” is disingenuous. They did pretty good business today.
Wait until you see what the weeknight attendance is this homestand and next before we start piling on the M’s management. I believe we’ll see a couple of sub-20,000 crowds for the Texas series.
Actually, I think we’ll see below 20,000 tomorrow.
Usually Texas crowds do worse than Anaheim. Fewer Rangers fans in this town. And usually the crowds are a little better opening homestand.
“Worst Opening Night crowd in over ten yearsâ€
To be fair, this was not a night game. I was actually a bit peeved the game was scheduled for the afternoon. I would’ve definitely been there for a night game, but I couldn’t get out of work for the afternoon.
Haven’t they added more seats since 2000? I think that this is the first year that tickets were available since 1995. I saw a good single seat in the infield terrace on the M’s website just a couple of days ago.
“Actually, I think we’ll see below 20,000 tomorrow.”
Tomorrow actually has the advantage of being a night game, so people who couldn’t make the opener might be tempted to consider this their opener.
Wednesday, on the other hand, is an afternoon game, it’s not the opener, and Felix isn’t pitching. I wouldn’t be surprised to see under 20,000 for that.
Try sitting in the 300 level on an April night with wind. There’s a reason they sell hot chocolate this time of year.
I agree with DW — I’m not at all concerned with the crowd tonight that was just short of a sellout. However, I am extremely concerned with the pre-sales for the rest of the games on this homestand. Having lost 11,000 season ticket holders in the last three seasons (down to about 16,000), those are pretty much the only tickets that the M’s sell for the April games.
Somehow they’ve even got 19,000 tickets still available for Dan Wilson Night this coming Saturday night! They’ll probably sell some more tickets for that game, esp. if the weather is going to be OK, but
the pre-sales for Friday and Sunday are all-time Safeco lows for weekend games.
Here’s the number of available tickets for the rest of this homestand:
Tuesday 27,500
Wednesday 27,000
Thursday 27,000
Friday 23,500
Saturday 19,000
Sunday 23,750
Why in the World they scheduled a day game for Wednesday, two days after an opening day 2:05 start is beyond me. The matinee games usually do pretty well, but not in April…
#7 Mat wrote: “Tomorrow actually has the advantage of being a night game, so people who couldn’t make the opener might be tempted to consider this their opener.”
Game 2 is historically one of the worst attended games every year. I sure wish more people considered it “their opener” but it just hasn’t worked out that way. Season ticketholders are pretty much the only ones who have purchased tickets for that game and it’s doubtful they’ll get much of a walkup.
Even more frustrating is that even if the team were to suddenly get hot and win some games it won’t affect April ticket sales very much. If they play well in April people won’t come out unless the weather is really good – people end up just deciding to watch on TV>
I think the night/day argument is a straw man. If the Mariners had been winners last season, and had added players likely to help them be a winner this year, the game would have sold out even if game time had been 2:05 a.m. There’s no whiff of excitement about this team; nobody really believes in them this year.
That’s what happened, in my opinion.
Try sitting in the 300 level on an April night with wind. There’s a reason they sell hot chocolate this time of year.
I sat in the 100 level one April evening in 2000. It was 40F and the winding was blowing in from the south, and the lid was closed. And it was an absolute blast freezer. It was getting compressed by the lower deck and blowing right into our backsides.
The next year they put all that glass in on the south side of the stadium to stop the wind.
“So, “worst in over ten years†is disingenuous.”
If you want to argue that it paints too simple a picture, sure. But disingenuous? Come on. I didn’t make those numbers up. There’s no deception or some plan to twist stats to make a point… I’m annoyed, obviously, by that word choice.
Might convince the team to put a winning product on the field. This is their relapse for not winning the last 2 years…
I’m also curious what happens tomorrow — I wonder if the M’s were thinking that they’d get Opening Day turnout for the day game and then overflow and first-night-game turnout on day 2. It’s weird scheduling, no doubt.
And I’m annoyed by the way this stat is being used because it does paint too simple a picture. It reminds me too much of the sort of political uses of stats that muddy the picture.
I know you didn’t mean any malice by it, but to me it’s a bad metric of attendance that doesn’t take into account different eras, stadia, and ambient public mood, at least if this is supposed to be a measure of fan interest of some sort.
To me, the fact that 1000 tickets were unsold isn’t that big a deal. The fact that we’re going to see a bunch of sub-20,000 games in April and possibly into May is far more troubling, since just two years ago they were drawing in the mid-to-upper-20’s during the same period.
“I think the night/day argument is a straw man. If the Mariners had been winners last season, and had added players likely to help them be a winner this year, the game would have sold out even if game time had been 2:05 a.m.”
Sure, if they were winners last year, they could’ve practically guaranteed a sellout. But that’s not the case, and the scheduling people knew that in advance. My point was that it seems like they could have sold more tickets given their situation.
Had they scheduled the game at night, I would’ve purchased four more tickets than the zero that I purchased. It’s even tough to argue that they decided on a 2pm start so that kids could attend the game without it going too late, because 2pm is before most schools dismiss for the day. (Last year, I was a bit luckier and able to dodge work for the afternoon, and I remember seeing quite a few stragglers after school ended for the day.) Even starting the game at something like 3:30 or 5:00 would give you more balance between how early you have to get off work, making sure it’s not too chilly for the whole game, and making sure that it’s family friendly.
I guess this whole season opening thing has just been rather annoying for me. No mlb.tv for opening night, and a day game I was unable to attend. Oh well, it’s a long season.
“I know you didn’t mean any malice by it,”
Seriously, go look up the word I flipped out over and you’ll see why I got mad. It implies calculated deception. If you want to feel reminded of politicians twisting stats to make a point, that’s fine. But read the post.
Fact #1 — it’s the worst Opening Day crowd in a long, long time.
Fact #2 to n — those are the Opening Day numbers
If you even want to argue I should have done more than present a bunch of numbers, or whatever, fine. But presenting a set of facts without analysis or anything is not in any way disingenuous.
My kids’ school system has Spring Break this week, so we went to the game. Had it been a night game, we would have watched it on TV.
Johjima’s home run was definitely the highlight, although Petagine’s was a close second. Honorable mention to Yuni for getting thrown out twice at third, yet somehow being called safe both times.
Most teams schedule opening day as a day game. It’s an event and can become a tradition among families and friends. I don’t see what is so odd about it.
The Kingdome numbers from 1995-1999 throw that off quite a bit, as Safeco doesn’t have the seating capacity of the Kingdome. Thus, when you look at 2000 on, you really don’t see much of a difference, save for a few hundred fewer seats filled. We drew 400 fewers fans than 2003, the last winning season before the spectre of losing took over.
As was stated, I think the attendance of this week’s games will be rather telling, save for the 2nd day game, which is just needlessly redundant given the team’s on-field performance is not a draw, neither is our opponent and neither is Jarrod Washburn.
Thoughts from an opening day fan… had to take a day off work to make it, but had decent tickets gifted, so that’s a fair trade.
the food service was interesting… you could actually recognize the staff that had been there last year, partly from attending a few games last year, but mostly because they were the only competant people working the stands (the only ones working at full speed, without a look of panic to their face).
My sampling included a burger from Kidd Valley (C), an Ivardog (an A as expected), garlic fries (suprisingly, a C), and beer (seemed like less microbrews this year… confirmation anyone?).
Overall – enjoyable but chilly. Less value for dollar than last year. I’ll prolly be going to less games this year than last, again. Oh well.
FYI, according to the schedule magnet given out today, there are 18 games that are not scheduled to be televised. That’s the most in years. These aren’t all weekday morning games either – some are weekend.
Game 2 is historically one of the worst attended games every year.
In the Kingdome days, I split my season tickets 6 or 7 ways and we had a draft to divide the games. Game 2 was almost always the last to be picked.
Certainly the performance of the team is a large factor, but after 5 years in Safeco word has gotten out that April night games are bitterly cold and no one wants to go unless they have season tickets or get freebies. And a related factor is with plenty of good seats available for summer games, it’s hard to plunk down $ for April games unless you’re trying to spread of your games over the season.
Raw numbers aside, at the game they announced it was a sellout — perhaps I was walking around at the time and heard the radio broadcast — and this is also in MLB.com’s game story.
So it sounds like they gave away some more tickets this year. The
DW wrote “To me, the fact that 1000 tickets were unsold isn’t that big a deal. The fact that we’re going to see a bunch of sub-20,000 games in April and possibly into May is far more troubling, since just two years ago they were drawing in the mid-to-upper-20’s during the same period.”
Totally agree — in fact, in 2002 when the M’s had 27,500 season ticketholders, they were drawing crowds of 30,000+ every night, even in April (they averaged 43,000 per game for the year!).
The dropoff in the club’s average attendance from ‘02 to ‘05 (43,000 to 34,000) almost exactly mirrors the dropoff in season tickets sold (3,000 season tickets lost per year x 3 years). Since they lost another 2,000 season ticket holders for ‘06, I’d expect the average attendance to be about 30-32,000 unless the team is in contention (in which case those 35,000 weekend crowds in the summer become sellouts and the 28,000 weeknight crowds in the summer become 37,000 to 40,000. If they’re somehow contending in September, the 22,000 crowds (with 10,000 no shows) would become 35,000+…
It’s pretty remarkable to think that the M’s will draw over 2 million this year again even if they lost 90+ games. In Detroit they barely topped 30,000 per game average the first year of Comerica (2000) and haven’t averaged 25,000 a game in the five years since…
Another thing that was worth the price of admission was watching Crazy Carl do his little dance while he was on first base. He looked like he was on the set of SNL for the Uncle Jemima’s Sour Mash Whiskey. He was rocking back and forth in a pseudo sprinter’s stance, waving his arms around, beating the hell out of his cleats with his helmet, kicking the crap out of the bag, sweating and muttering to himself.
It’s just too bad he is only entertaining like that when he’s on first base so we probably won’t see it too often this year.
But presenting a set of facts without analysis or anything is not in any way disingenuous.
While the facts support the conclusion, these numbers need context and analysis for the conclusion to be useful.
But disingenuous was over-the-top. It was the word that jumped into my head, even though it wasn’t in any way disingenous.
I was at that 1995 game, incidentally. That is all.
But omitting “but not by a statistically significant amount, and it was a day game”
The headline gives the appearance that the Mariners suckitude has had an effect on opening day attendance. That’s not true, and anyone who claims to be statistically competent should know better.
Of course, you didn’t come out and say it, just wrote the headline to create that impression. That’s not dishonest, but its practically the definition of disingenuous.
or it’s an Interesting Fun Fact.
lighten up y’all!
#30 –
not to out-pedant you, but the statement you quoted was, indeed, a fact – the Opening Day crowd was the worst in a long, long time. There doesn’t appear to be any attempt to extrapolate from that data, as you seem to think; the post was merely a list of attendances over the last 10 years, of which this year’s was the worst.
Relax. It’s a long season. This was a tidbit of information, nothing more.
Actually, last night’s attendance was 3.77 standard deviations below the mean for the previous five years, so it IS a statistically significant difference. The point is, the M’s DID NOT sell out Opening Day.
Furthermore, availability is far greater than any year since they moved to the Safe. You can get blocks of tickets — not just singles or doubles — in any category, even for the Yankees or whichever color of sock you care to see. They also have extended the family night promotion to Field and Terrace seats as well as View. $100 for four Field seats + soda and hotdogs is a very good deal for single game tickets, and you can still get good ones for Wednesday.
I think everyone realizes attendance will be down this year, even the team. Especially the team.
Yeah, what pdb said. I don’t understand what’s going on here.
Also, this was not the only day game opener. Of the Safeco starts –
2000 – 45,552 (night) 4/4
2001 – 45,911 (night) 4/2
2002 – 46,036 (day), 4/1 WEEKDAY
2003 – 45,931 (day) 4/8 WEEKDAY
2004 – 46,142 (day) 4/6 WEEKDAY
2005 – 46,249
So there.
As an aside, I once told my office’s marketing department that all marketing is necessarily disingenuous.
They weren’t familiar with the word.
“Because something is happening here
But you don’t know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?”
Wow, folks gettin’ testy over one well fought loss… It is going to be a long season here at the good ship…
Paul
Me too! Randy Johnson pitched 8 (?) scoreless innings, and Ken Griffey Jr. hit a 3-run homer for the only runs of the game.
Come to think of it, the only two opening day games I’ve been to were 1995 and 2001, arguably the two most exciting years in M’s history (although both times, that would have been hard to predict on opening day). They should pay me to attend …
Would you go a restaurant that serves bad food 5 or 6 times a month and wonder why the food doesn’t improve? The fact is, the Mariners put a bad product on the field. You all complain about it over and over again. The manager is bad, WFB get’s too much playing time, the rotation isn’t very good….yada, yada, yada. The only REAL way for fans to protest this is to not go. Even die hard mariner fans have to show their displeasure. Probably one of the best ways to show this displeasure is to not get so excited about opening day as to buy a ticket. Certianly not buying a ticket for the following games is a sign of disenchantment as well. IF you put a bad product on the field and the fans continue to show up, pretty soon you are the Cubs.
Would “Mariners draw 455 people less than their last 6 year average” have generated 40+ responses?
I don’t know what adjective to use, but it was not very straightforward.
As for the statistical significance: no, it’s not.
This is about a complete non-story as you will see.
Princeton defines the word as: “not straightforward or candid; giving a false appearance of frankness”. Nothing about being willfully deceptive.
But sometimes the chef comes up with a great special, or the waitress is simply stunning, or the busboy makes a miraculous recovery of the falling plate, or the ambiance is delightful. I guess my point is, the restuarant analogy doesn’t hold. Even a mediocre baseball team provides drama, unpredictablility and entertainment that bad food can’t touch. Yesterday we saw, just from Johjima, power, solid contact, good plate coverage, heads up defense and active working with his pitchers. I saw a lot to like.
If you are shouting BOYCOTT after one frigging game, you are in for a long season and perpetual frustration from the game of baseball.
Paul
If we accept that it’s possible to give a false appearance of frankness by acceident, that distinction matters.
How would that work? Clearly then you would have to be trying not to be frank, but appearing to be frank at the same time. Could that even happen?
Didn’t this just happen?
The less harsh definition of the word is the equivalent of “not straightforward”. Being called disingenuous might itself be disingenuous depending on how you define the word!
In any case, the headline made a mountain out of a mole hill. Whatever adjective that corresponds to, that’s what it is.
A guy could play 161,158,159,159,158,157,159,160 games, and on that last one you would blare “Andruw Jones plays in the most games in 7 years!”
think the night/day argument is a straw man. If the Mariners had been winners last season, and had added players likely to help them be a winner this year, the game would have sold out even if game time had been 2:05 a.m.
of course, that assumes that the so-called ‘average fan’ actually notices when they add players, and who those players are. Last year there were a lot of folks at the start of the year who didn’t know that there were new 1st & 3rd basemen, or who they were.
This is about a complete non-story as you will see.
The Mariners not selling out Opening Day like they have since coming over to Safeco is significant (keep in mind the extra bleachers in section 101 add to seating capacity), but the really significant part is the 27,000 or more seats available for each game the rest of the series, and the low weekend sales. I think it’s a sucker bet that attendance is going to be considerably down the first week comparing this year to last- and we’re going to see that the appetite for crappy baseball in Seattle does have limits. (BTW- the 2nd game for the M’s last year drew 28,373.)
I was going to tell you why it was so hackle-rific for me, but I then realized it would send this thread in a really, really bad direction.
I’d be happy to tell you offline. I swear it’s not personal.
While perhaps not statistically significant, the fact that Opening Day did not sell out (or apparently sell out) until the day of the game is significant. Opening Day numbers are capped by the park’s seating capacity. The real measure here should be demand for tickets. Up until perhaps last year, previous Opening Days sold out well in advance, which indicated a demand exceeding supply. Without the seating capacity restriction, the M’s would have sold more 46,000 tickets in those years. When placed in context with other, more telling factors (declining season ticket base, declining advance ticket sales, the onset of awkward huckstering of luxury suites during broadcasts), the Opening Day tickets sales indicate a softening demand for M’s tickets in general.
I’m one of the 2,000 who did not renew season tickets. While I made the decision based on an overall cost/benefit analysis, I picked up the phone to cancel my deposit at the moment I realized that I did not want to pay a Jarrod Washburn tax of approximately $3.40 per ticket for 81 games.
Didn’t this just happen?
No. Derek made a perfectly factual statement, and dw declared (through his disingenuity comment) that Derek had allowed the potential for inference, something I would never declare to be Derek’s fault.
Derek’s statement was absolutely true. True statements can’t convey a false appearance of frankness.
Even if we use the “not straightforward” definition, it still doesn’t apply. If I present data, and then describe the data absolutely accurately (even though not completely), I can’t have been anything other than straightforward. Other people’s inferences can’t ever be my fault.
Definitions of words matter. Precision matters.
It’s like if I said that some player had put up his worst batting average in 10 years. That he’d spent the previous 10 years in Arlington, and this year played in RFK, and also added 20 HR and 60 BB to his batting line, is entirely irrelevant.
His walks and power went up, and his park-adjusted BA may have also gone up, but I wasn’t talking about those things.
#48 – The real measure here should be demand for tickets. Up until perhaps last year, previous Opening Days sold out well in advance, which indicated a demand exceeding supply. Without the seating capacity restriction, the M’s would have sold more 46,000 tickets in those years.
This is exactly the point! For all we know, opening day ticket demand could have exceeded 100K at some point in time. We don’t really know the demand loss because we have nothing to base it on when the event is sold out. It is incorrect to say that the difference in lack of interest is simply a handful of seats when you look at it this way.
Imagine if you have sex with your wife, and then she says, “That’s the worst sex we’ve had in over ten years.” In the morning, you check the sex-o-meter that you keep bedside and find that 1) she’s including a five-year period when your member was approximatley 25% larger (i.e., a “Kingdome”) and 2) that while last night’s performance was actually rated lower than any other in the past 7 years, it’s only 0.85% less than the mean performance over the same period.
You might think the use of the adjective “worst,” while factually true, was an unnecessary (or perhaps hurtful) overstatement, right?
My Andruw Jones example in post #44 is the same thing as what Derek did. The *headline* is what made the presentation poor. It’s spin.
I completely agree that it’s *demand* that should be measured, and that if you sellout, it’s different if you sellout with 20,000 waiting and with 2 people waiting. Saying that you didn’t sellout, while in previous years saying you’d have tons of people waiting, is highly statistically significant. *That* would be a great story.
For a non-Seattle fan, I have no idea what the headline is supposed to represent, other than what it represents: a true mole hill statement that was given mountain status.
2002 – 46,306
2005 – 46,249
2006 – 45,515
How interesting? These numbers say that the Mariners had more people on Opening Day last year then in 2002, the year after they won 116 games. Wow! Those signings of Sexson and Beltre must have been really exciting to fans after the M’s lost 90 plus games in 2004. I was there last year, and the crowd was pretty pumped. And the two homers by Sexson only helped fuel the fire. Too bad it didn’t last past the first game.
I was there yesterday, and the crowd was just dead. Maybe it was the lack of sunshine and home run power early on by the Mariners, which was different then the year before. The crowd got going after K-Jo’s blast, but it was all over after the M’s had the bases loaded with no outs and couldn’t score a run. The home run in the ninth by Petagine was shocking. I think fans were more stunned then excited. Most people figured it was over after the Angels took the lead in the ninth. Hopefully, the Petagine homer will encourage fans to stick around. But probably since the M’s lost anyways, it’s going to take more to change the morale of the fans.
I also noticed the unusally long lines for souveniors, food, and the bathrooms (some of which were out of order). It just seemed like the staff was unprepared. Add that to the fact that it was $5 for garlic fries and $6 for pizza, and I didn’t spend a dime in the ballpark. I had no desire to fight the crowds in the Team Store after the game, but I’m pretty sure it was a nightmare in there as well.
Hopefully annoying things like this won’t continue to fester in the ballpark.
What makes it disingenuous is that it would have been just as “factual” to say “Opening Night Crowd Just About the Same Usual.” Worst = hyperbole when the variance is so tiny.
Admit the error and move on.
54 – The Mariners added seating capacity since 2002.
55 – Weren’t you the guy who implied that we shouldn’t bring Guadado into the game in the 9th yesterday because we needed him to save the game?
[...] Yesterdays home opener, was not a sell-out. The USS Mariner is reporting that last nights attendance was the Worst Opening Night in 10 years with 45,515 through the gate. [...]
54 – The Mariners added seating capacity since 2002.
Let me correct myself first. The numbers should be 46,036 fans in 2002 and 46,259 fans in 2005. I guess I didn’t think about the extra seating capacity. If the M’s had it back in 2002, I’m sure they would have had more fans on Opening Day then in 2005.
Anyway, my original comment still stands. Statistical nuances aside, this does not bode well for the team. And I remember Opening Day 1977.
Worst is a factual statement, just like “first”. If you want to argue there should be a qualifier, or whatever, that’s your thing, but it was the worst in a long time.
I still don’t understand why there’s this assumption that I was trying to imply something, much less that there’s a deceptive connotation implied. There’s nothing there except dates and numbers.
People. Take a deep breath, and repeat after me.
It was a list of attendances.
It was a list of numbers.
It was nothing more than that.
The headline was a factual statement based on the list of numbers; any inference there is brought to the table by the reader, not the writer. It is true to say that yesterday’s attendance was the “worst” in 10 years, based on the information in the post itself.
Can we please move on to something, y’know, important now?
yeah, what DMZ said.
pdb: some people are enjoying this party. You can leave if you like, but why tell us the party is over? Do I need to quote Belushi?
DMZ: The complete lack of text surrounding the numbers, other than the headline and the bold line (which was surrounded by extra space) was a scream “look at me!”. As presented, it’s nothing but a mole hill. Perhaps we are making a mountain of it, but given the context of the rest of the wonderful site, the expectation is that a mole hill would never be presented here.
Accompanying text, like “we didn’t sell out, while in other years we’d be turning back 10,000 people at the gate” would tie-in with the headline.
I stand by my Andruw Jones example as being equivalent to the lead-in. The lead-in is nothing but a trivial factual headline and list that is given incredible prominence on a highly visited and respected site.
Again, who would claim a .300, .310, .301, .303, .299 line represents anything at all of significance? Factual does not mean clear.
We present mole hills all the time here. I wrote a whole post about a fricking’ Bugs Bunny cartoon.
That was a mountain!
Derek, you seem to be wearing the wrong glasses. That post will live longer than some people’s lives. You turned coal into diamond with that one.
Derek’s previous post stated:
Derek’s previous post stated:
Announced attendance was 45,515. The Mariners didn’t sell out. I can’t remember the last time that happened.
There was some context for the “Worst†headline.
Unfortunately, unless Jeffrey Wigand now works in the M’s ticket office, any sort of data concerning the actual demand for Opening Day tickets over recent years will remain out of the public eye. Sort of like UZR.
West Coast King said:
April 4th, 2006 at 11:03 am
[...]I was there last year, and the crowd was pretty pumped. And the two homers by Sexson only helped fuel the fire. Too bad it didn’t last past the first game.
I was there yesterday, and the crowd was just dead.
I’ve seen this comment a lot on various other message boards, particularly from Red Sox and Yankee fans. They don’t seem to understand that the typical Mariners fan doesn’t froth at the mouth, scream incessantly all game long, or spontaneously jump up and do a happy dance in the aisle. Rarely seen, Mariners-colors face or body paint…
We just sit and sip our Starbucks coffee, watch the game, and try to chat with our neighbors over the constant din of the PA system. And if the team actually does something worthy of excitement, we DO show excitement.
No wonder the crowd was dead most of the time last night…
I’m hoping this is an omen. I’ve been saying for the last several years, as long as M’s fans turn out in droves for a lousy team, the owners will save money and give them a lousy team. (See Cubs, Chicago.) If attendance finally crashes this year, maybe ownership will get the message and start recruiting better players.
Factual does not mean clear.
No more than unclear means disingenuous.
If I say that the attendance was the worst in 10 years, that’s all I’ve said. I’ve told you nothing about the size of the variance or the significance of the reduction.
Inference is always the fault of the inferrer.
Boycott afte one game? No, I didn’t say that, or infer it….lol. What I said was, one of the onyl ways fans have to show their displeasure of the product is not to go. Some fans show it after one game, I guess. Some after 5 years, in the case of the Cubs, they don’t show it. They keep accepting a bad product. Probably for the reasons you mention….good atmosphere and entertainment. Me, I’m not entertained by bad baseball. That’s what the Mariners have given us over the past year, year to two years. I’ll go when Felix pitches to see good pitching. I’ll go when the good clubs come to town to see good baseball. I won’t go to most games, though. Not until the product they put on the field on a day to day basis improves to “playoff contention caliber.”
The Mariners are not playoff contention caliber…and I didn’t just figure that out after one game.
I’m hoping this is an omen. I’ve been saying for the last several years, as long as M’s fans turn out in droves for a lousy team, the owners will save money and give them a lousy team. (See Cubs, Chicago.) If attendance finally crashes this year, maybe ownership will get the message and start recruiting better players.
that is two separate issues. They spend money, they don’t always spend money on ‘better players’
Evan, it was poorly presented by Derek and poorly interpreted by some of us.
Derek is a gifted writer, and I (as I’m sure many others did) took his presentation (the headline, the bolding, etc) with the lack of commentary as a commentary.
Karen – I’ve attended quite a few M’s games over the years including every opening day since 96. The crowd was dead.
DMZ – did you influence the Bugs Bunny clip being shown on the DiamondVisiony thing?
I guess that would be “deader than normal”, eh, zzyzx?
WINNER! Greatest disparity between number of posts and worth of commentary.
I.e., commentary contained within the posts.
WINNER! Greatest disparity between number of posts and worth of commentary.
Think of it as a Turn Back The Clock thread, back to the days of the Usenet and low signal-to-noise.