I am no expert in what will make a crowd be loud or more vociferous fans, but I have one - almost trifling - suggestion. Put in bleachers for the closest seats to the court. No more padded comfortable seats that cradle your buttocks with loving efficiency. Put in cold, hard aluminum bleachers that are impossible to sit down in for very long. Fans that don't sit down are more likely to cheer than those sitting down. Oh, and institute a dress code, absolutely no suits allowed. ------------------ The Rockets will be the NBA champions. Believe.
Don't forget the ushers should have cattle prods to use at their discretion whenever the Rockets need some extra support from those dirty Greenway Suits. ------------------ Cause I'm a twenty first century digital boy. I don't know how to read, but I got a lot of toys. My daddy's a lazy middle class intellectual. My mommy's on valium, so ineffectual. Oh Oh, ain't life a mystery? [This message has been edited by Band Geek Mobster (edited March 09, 2001).]
I was sitting on the opposite side of the floor from the benches. It reminds me of that John Lennon quote when the Beatles played for the queen and he said, "Those of you in the cheap seats can clap. The rest of you can just rattle your jewelry." I hope that more tickets will become available in a building where luxury suites and club seats occupy 2500 to 3500 seats of an 18,500 seat building, but who knows. ------------------ Art don't pay the rent.
I say all this corporate seat business is the IRS's fault. Corporations shouldn't be allowed to write off NBA tickets as business expenses. True fans have to pay real money.
Some good points here...and my company is part of the problem. I went to the game last night and made lots of noise....the guy who went with me ( a co-worker) cheered some...but he is not a rabid fan like me. In fact, I only have one or two friends that cheer as loud and often as I do...the rest dont for some reason. Even if they are into the game...they dont cheer except for the big plays. Worse yet, sometimes we give them away to out of town clients...or even people from other countries. You have to give them a break....because most have never been to an NBA game...so they certainly arent gonna make a lot of noise or root for our team fanatically. Unfortunately, there is no way I can buy seats down there myself @ $59.00 per game....so I have to share with others who are not as loud as myself sometimes....thems the breaks! The Rockets arent going to lower the prices of those seats if companies and rich folks will pay that much for them. So us average Joes are consigned to the cheap seats...unless you are lucky enough to get them for free as an employee benefit. ------------------
Jeff, were you sittiing behind the Rocket bench? There were a group of guys behing the bench that would stand up and go nuts whenever the Rockets did something. Everyone else around them just sat there. Also, I don't know if its the microphones turned down or what, but it seems (when watching on TV) the crowd is loud during timeouts (Clutch and Turbo get them going) but when the game starts back up the noise dies. Houston has the least vocal fans in all of the NBA as well as MLB, IMO. ------------------ "Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."- (Aldous Huxley)