Well, the tickets were definitely sold to someone. I tried to get a couple of tickets through the Rockets' website to no avail. A friend called the box office and was told that the game was sold out.
The NBA is a rich man's sport. I went to see the Raptors last year. We were in the back row of the arena and tickets were like $50 each. It's crazy. Compare that to baseball where you can get low upper-level seats (excellent seats) for less than nine bucks. I think it's like that for any NBA team. If you reduce tickets to a sensible price, you will get more fans. Until that happens, there will be empty seats.
I made this point awhile back in another thread that pro-sports have taken the angle of creating luxurious stadiums with lots of amenities to attract corporate expense account clientele. The problem with that though is that the tradition of team spectator sports has always been a particapatory experience with the fans adding to the experience. A lot of pro-sports teams talk about how great of an experience college games but if you look at their marketing and design strategy they are going the other way by focussing on loading up the stadium with as many amenities as possible to justify raising the ticket prices. What this does though is create luxurious but sterile sports environments where a cultural divide is created between the average fan vs. the high buck corporate clientele that can afford the tickets. Certainly corporate clients can also be huge fans but corporations generally are not buying up tickets to be used for expense accounts because they love the team but because they see a marketing opportunity to generate more business. If you want an environment to market to a potential client the last thing you want is to be somewhere where there are major distractions like rowdy cheering fans. Looking at it from the short term it makes sense that pro-sports teams want to create a business friendly environment. A corporation with a huge expense account is going to be willing to pay more money than most rabid fans on their own can afford. The problem with this is that fans are part of the experience and that the fans themselves become part of the branding of the team. For instance the Dawg Pound, the Black Hole, Cheeseheads, Cameron Crazies and etc... Rowdy and loud fans are what give stadiums their reputation far more than what sort of luxury amenities they have and help to sell the team to a far wider audience. So while a luxurious stadium might help sell overpriced tickets to local expense account customers a loud roudy crowd on TV sells the team brand to a nationwide, and now worldwide, audience.
I dont' know about worst, but this was kinda crazy...I didn't even hear the red rowdies, and that surprised me...A win is a win, but man, was it UGLY!!!
There are very few cities that are not "fair-weather" cities when it comes to professional sports. The Rockets will sell out when they are winning. I didn't hear people complaining about Houston being a horrible sports city the past few years during baseball season. All I heard was how the Astros have such a great home field advantage. They were even having great attendance when they were left for dead by just about everybody. As for the Rockets ... yeah sorry, but not having the $250 seats filled at the start of a game that starts early doesn't tell me anything about the city as a sports town. I live in San Diego and this is about the same as Houston in terms of attendance, but half the attendance comes from the opposing team.
Seriously. Even Yankee attendance blew when the team sucked, and there's a gazzilion people in that city (early 90's Yankees home attendance was below league average....though those are the only 4 years of the last 87 that has happened). It's difficult to think of any city where attendance remains solid year after year after year without matching performance from the team.
I went to the Bulls game last night with a couple friends who had scored $160 club season tickets from work. The seats were awesome and the 'club' is pretty sweet, but the fans down there really and truly sucked. I felt like I almost had to apologize for jumping out of my seat and yelling at the refs. People are looking at me like 'why won't this @$$hole shut up'. Ok so then at half time, my roommate who was also at the game got us up into his corporate Suite. This is so awesome it blew my mind - but absolutely sterile. At the end of the day, the club/suite experience is phenemonal from an amenities/luxuries standpoint. Its pretty much heaven killing wings and heineken in the suite - but I honestly prefer being on the upper bowl down in the front yelling, screaming and swearing - trying to keep ketchup from the hot dog off my shirt, drinking foamy beer and generally having a blast for like $55.
for one that is the case many times, and also those tickets that are not center court in the club lower level are overpriced and unsold by the box offfice for most games.
thats why basketball is number 3 sport in the US sucks ass they need to calm down with those ticket prices
i was at the game and it was pretty bad. two people in front of me (dad/son) didn't say a word and clapped like a bunch of pansies... houston is lame. Go to the garden in NY witness how bad the knicks are, but you wont' find an empty seat or silent clappers... Texans games are lame too...granted the team sucks.
Ethnic diversity? What, blacks/hispanics/asians don't like basketball? Even if that were true (which it ain't) the T-Center only holds 18,000 people. There's enough of any ethnic group to fill it in a given night. Houston sports fans are just not that passionate about their teams. it's just the truth. When you go to other cities you realize the difference.
do you actually go to games? or are you one of those arm-chair complainers? the crowd is VERY diverse. Every row is multi-ethnic do youself a favor and step outside of the box your living in... scientific studies? lol...
The Astros just drew 3 million fans. They've done that 3 times in the last 6 years. The Texans sell out every game. There's a waiting list for tickets. The Rockets built a stadium with bars and restaurants....the seats you see empty are purchased. The folks who should be sitting in them are entertaining clients in the bars and restaurants. This is what happens when you charge these sorts of prices for tickets.
