No offense to Les but when those two were running the Rockets back in the 80's the Summit was packed every night. Now I prefer Les and CD as far as putting a team together but Charlie Thomas and Steve Patterson found away to get Houston excited about the Rockets. It seems like I remember Les complaining about how hard it was to fill the Summit even when the Rockets were winning championships (I moved from Houston in 89 so I don't know for sure) when he first bought the team. Back in the mid 80's after Houstons champoinship dreams were squashed by the drug problems of Lewis Lloyd, Mitchel Wiggins and John Lucas the Rockets made us think we found the next Isiah Thomas when we plucked Avery Johnson from the CBA. Rockets fans were excited and continued to fill the Summit. I use to buy the 9 dollar cheap tickets in the mid to late 80's on a regular basis because that is all I could get and the summit was always packed. I thought that there was a string of like two or three years where the Summit was sold out every night. If Jeff or Clutch or someone else has a way of getting attendance numbers from the 80's (in perticular the Twin Tower years) I would be interested in seeing them so I will know that I was not just hallucinating about the attendance in the 80's. On nights that the Rockets did not play in town there was a sports bar on Richardson and Chimney Rock (cant remember the name) that was packed with Rockets fans drinking beer and cheeing for the Rockets. Has the atmosphere in Houston changed that much? It was shocking to see so many empty seats for the first two home games. Even Jeff Bagwell made a comment about it in an interveiw at the half of one of the games. Steve Francis has mentioned the lack of fan support on several occasions. If Francis leaves when his contract is up I would think fan support would play a factor. How can Houston not be excited about this team!!!? I know the Rockets have the best group of fanatical core fans in the NBA but what about the avg fan? Where have they gone? Personally I can't wait to take my son to the Rockets games when they play in Dallas!
