When the fans are engaged, the early season Texans games won't be a factor. But the fans aren't back just yet, not much buzz, so the Texans game probably had a big impact on the attendance yesterday.
The Texans in their 2-14 season drew better rating the Astros NLCS game. I think in terms of houston fandom: 1.Texans 10. Astros 13. Rockets.
Well nobody is doubting that, in fact I think you may be giving the Rockets and Astros too much credit. But MMP was packed and rocking louder than any park in the majors. Even with the Texans there was more than enough juice for the Astros. This town is big enough for the both of them.
Different time, Houston didn't draw well at all for anything other than football for decades. The dome was at best half full until around 98. I've said this to people many times, the transplants that came during the boom weren't Houstonians and didn't care about our teams. Their kids on the other hand are Houston born and bred. The amount of people with actual Houston roots and a connection to the city is probably 3x what it was in the 80's and early 90's.
The tickets, are - yes, but the outings are not. Corporate tickets are generally used in, well, three ways: 1) client engagement; 2) employee reward; 3) "no one else wanted them..." (I fall under this category often) In a depressed industry, the client engagement is significantly reduced, obviously, because they don't want to pay for parking, food, drinks, etc. Meanwhile, employers don't, generally, reward employees while laying off large swaths of their personnel. It's bad form. And when morale is way down, employees are far less likely to take up any offers, for fear they'll look either insensitive or, worse, irresponsible. Next time you're at MMP, check out the suites... I would wager a good chunk of them are empty. Those get *really* expensive ($1,000+/night).
And they still had trouble selling out non Randy Johnson starts and (granted: afternoon) playoff games that year. Minute Maid Park is what truly revitalized baseball in Houston.
Yep. Totally agreed (even though MMP didn't sellout their playoff games in 2001 either... again, afternoon games). People also forget that even during the Oilers heyday years before they left, the routinely had to get tickets bought in bulk at the last second (usually by Randalls or Gallery Furniture) in order to sellout to have the local blackout lifted. The Astrodome was about as desirable a venue then as it is now... and yet the nostalgia surrounding it is prolonging its overall misery.
Outside of when Randy Johnson pitched I think it was disappointing for the most part which is weird because they didn't have an NFL team to compete with. This is going off the few games I went to during the mid to late 90s.
Day playoff games suck. Also: they were playing the Braves. Again. Yawn. And some restlessness had absolutely settled in by 2001. They were 0-fer '97-'99, sucked in '00 and didn't they let Everett and Hampton walk prior to '01 season? People who were there in '80, '86, '04-'05 will tell you: this is a baseball town. It's not baseball 24/7; but if they have a really good team, people show up and they get LOUD. It's fun, man.... I traveled from Dallas for... 90% of those home playoff games in '04-'05; just awesome memories.
Agreed on the day playoff games (mid-week) as the biggest culprit. They didn't have to worry about those in 2004 and 2005... as those games were all on the weekends. Same thing is potentially set up for this year as well...
I think people, especially this town's awful print media, are severely underestimating the damage done by both their approach to this rebuild as well as the team not even being on TV for two seasons.
If anything, the way the print media was vilifying the Astros during the process... along with the appropriate response of the Astros now shunning them... and now their reciprocal saltines for that... has helped the print media contribute to the situation (at the very least, they're not helping the problem).
I love that the Astros leak storied to national writers over the Chronicle. That whole crew should be ashamed of themselves.
Agreed, which makes their public shaming of Astros fans even more ridiculous. I'd venture to say no fanbase has ever had to endure what ours has during this rebuild. I also imagine that the front office understands this.
We may be overstating the importance of a print media. It's 2015; the Chronicle is not that vital anymore...
Not to the above-average sports fan... which is who is in here right now, who is following everybody on twitter, who is far more aware of all the ins/outs of the team and why attendance is truly down. But to the common lay-fan, who may still watch the local news for info... and who happen to be the ones to decide whether or not to buy tickets for a given game, etc.... it can still be of influence. Overall, however, Houston's print media lags compared to nearly every other major market... and their handling of the Astros has been an embarrassment.
