They played in front of 8,839....are you serious!? http://mlb.mlb.com/news/boxscore.jsp?gid=2007_05_16_texmlb_tbamlb_1&c_id=tb
How long do these experiments have to go before the owners realize that people in Florida don't watch baseball. They don't watch it in Miami, they don't watch it in Tampa, and apparantly, they don't watch it in Orlando. A lot of people do go to Spring Training. A lot of people from out of state.
If recall correctly, I think they last time the Rays played at home there were only like 7700 people or something. The funny thing is that the Devil Rays hav sick young talent. Upton, Young, Crawford, Dukes, Kazmir, etc.
didn't montreal (currently washington nationals) consistently draw crowds under 5000 before they moved?
The Expos averaged 12,662 in 2003 and 9,356 in 2004 but the final year they were already expected to move so you can probably attribute the drop to that. They did however, play several games with attendance in the sub 5000 area.
They don't watch in Miami because the football stadium they play in is 40 minutes away from anything. ==== I think the all time low for a MLB regular season crowd was in Oakland in the late 80s. I believe they drew a little less than 900 for a game.
remember when the Indians couldn't draw 10,000 fans to a game in the 80's?? then they built Jacobs Field, started to win and all of a sudden were considered the greatest baseball fans in the country? people go see winners. there are but a few exceptions to that. for as great a baseball town Boston is, good seats were still available in the early 90's Mike Greenwell era!
Case in point: I travelled to Boston for business in 1995, in August if I recall correctly. I was there for a week. I wanted to go to a Sox game....hadn't been to Fenway before (or Boston for that matter). Three weeks before my trip, I bought a single seat to a Red Sox/Royals game on the Wednesday night I would be there. The ticket was in the front row, directly behind home plate. The game stunk, the Sox beat the crap out of the Royals, there were about 20,000 people there, and I had the time of my life!
Of course they want to watch baseball in florida just not the d-rays and Marlins. All the old retired folks from New York are Yankees fans. Do you ever see attendance problems when the Yanks play in Tampa? Was there not more Yankee fans in Miami during the World Series? Look the d-rays have some nice players but the team is horrible so I can't imagine having season tickets to that so when one of the worst teams in baseball (Texas Rangers) comes to town nobody will be there.
