Attendance at Monday's game

Yotesfan85044 · April 14th, 2003, 11:55 PM

Saw this in the ESPN game notes for Monday night's game...

Quote:

The crowd of 25,688 was smaller than for any Arizona home game last season. The franchise low was 23,057 against Florida on April 25, 2001.

This is disappointing. I know it was a Monday night game which typically don't do very well in attendance, but this was the smallest crowd since 2001. Where's the fan support when the team needs it the most? I can't say I'm suprised. Phoenix fans in general have always been fickle sports fans. When a Phoenix team does well, the stands are packed. But as soon as the team's fortunes turn south, fans don't show up. Just look at the Suns and Coyotes. And of course the Cardinals.

I'll be at BOB Tuesday night cheering on our D'Backs I hope more of the seats will be filled....

GO D'BACKS!

WestValleyFan · April 15th, 2003, 05:35 AM

What did you expect with this bandwagon town. Move the D-backs to the west valley where real fans will show up all the time.

DbaxJ · April 15th, 2003, 07:51 AM

Announced attendance at the game was over 27K... guess that covers all the folks that have tix that didnt show??

WizardOfAz · April 15th, 2003, 07:55 AM

No cause for concern, they are still 5th overall in attendance:

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/attendance

mark1 · April 15th, 2003, 08:31 AM

Phoenix is a bandwagon town. If you think attendance is bad now, wait until they are out of the race by the end of April.

GO GET A HITTER!

DbaxJ · April 15th, 2003, 08:56 AM

Boy that just shows it too. They will hardly be out of it by the end of April. So a rough streak at the begining of the season and now they are toast?

mark1 · April 15th, 2003, 09:02 AM

I will always root for the D-Backs win or lose.
The reason they will be out of the race early is because, they are just not good enough IMO.

DbaxJ · April 15th, 2003, 09:10 AM

Well, you are entitled to your opinion.. thats for sure, but why do you think they are not good enough this year as opposed to last or the year before?

moviegeekjn · April 15th, 2003, 09:39 AM

Taking the bad with the good (as painful as that is) remains part of long term fandom...

Easily cited are the long suffering Cubs and Red Sox fans, who approach each Spring with renewed hopes only to know deep down that they will be bitterly disappointed by the Fall.

But other successful franchises go through the same thing. A team can be great one year and just not have everything working their way the next....I discovered this early on with the St. Louis Cardinals, who gave me one of my happiest early baseball memories by beating the hated Yankees in the 1964 World Series. They were one of the dominant teams of the decade with another championship in 1967 and near miss in 1968.

But sandwiched between those championships was
1965: an 80 - 81 record for 7th place
1966: a slightly better 83 - 79 record for 6th place

and following those great teams of the sixties were a lot of mediocre and bad teams in the 1970's when the Redbirds were never contenders...

The D'backs have far exceeded any "reasonable" expectations during their first five years in the Valley, spoiling too many fans with their success. The season ain't over yet, but if it turns out to be "one of those down years" that's all part of the baseball experience--plenty to evaluate and discuss.... but not a time to desert.

DbaxJ · April 15th, 2003, 09:47 AM

Thats true, but just by the first 2 weeks people are already down on them, and that is what is even more disappointing. You can not judge their season already.... There are 150ish games left... so much time to do anything... that its just way too early to say they are out of it and having a down year!!!!

mark1 · April 15th, 2003, 09:57 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by DbaxJ
Well, you are entitled to your opinion.. thats for sure, but why do you think they are not good enough this year as opposed to last or the year before?

Thats a good question you ask.

For one thing their bench is much weaker without Colby and Ruby. The D-Backs had the best bench in baseball the last two years IMO. Even though he played part time you can make a good case that Colby was our best hitter last year. Also, it's not realistic to think that Junior or Q are going to put up the same numbers they did last year, and even in the best of times Junior is not a 3 hole hitter. Also, even though they are great pitchers, I think it's unrealistic to think Randy and Curt will go 47 and 12 again this year. I could go on and on.

The fact of the matter is, aside from Gonzo, this batting order scares nobody. As I have stated many times, this team needs a consistent run producer to hit behind or ahead of Gonzo, and until they get one this team will waste good pitching performances like they got out of Kim last night. I know good hitters don't grow on trees, and clubs don't give them up easily, but, the Diamondbacks have some good young prospects they could include in a trade. If you look at the Giants front office compared with the D-Back front office during the winter, the Giants were interested in getting better by adding guys like Jose Cruz, Marquis Grissom, Ray Durham, Edgardo Alfonzo. The Diamondback management was only interested in cutting payroll. This team needed to get better over the winter to return to the World Series, instead they got worse. Just my opinion

DWKB · April 15th, 2003, 10:00 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by DbaxJ
Thats true, but just by the first 2 weeks people are already down on them, and that is what is even more disappointing. You can not judge their season already.... There are 150ish games left... so much time to do anything... that its just way too early to say they are out of it and having a down year!!!!

As mooviegeek said, good with the bad. I was looking through the first week posts from last year over at azprosports.com and saw threads talking about Randy winning 30 and Jr. being the best 2B in MLB.

WestValleyFan · April 15th, 2003, 03:54 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by DbaxJ
Well, you are entitled to your opinion.. thats for sure, but why do you think they are not good enough this year as opposed to last or the year before?

Johnson is feeling his age, it is obvious. He is still a good pitcher, but he won't be dominating.

Schilling will win more than he loses, but overall, he too is showing signs of age.

Without those two being able to perform as they did in the past two seasons, their pitching staff is, barely, average.

Offensively, they are old, also.

It's common knowledge to anyone who understands what has happened, Gerry Colangelo sold out the future of this team for immediate success.

He got what he wanted, but now it will be a long time, if at all, that they become competitive, again.

And, watch the crowds dwindle, for several reasons.

The cost is too high for average fans.

The corporate people, those who fill the higher priced seats, will begin to dwidle as the team's success drops off, because it won't be the "in" thing anymore, to be at a D-backs game.

Most of the females who , now, attend the games, so they can go to the hairdresser and gab about it to their girlfriends wont want to be there anymore cause , other than the fact that it's cool to be part of a winner, they won't want to be associated with a loser.

And, if you watch these females, at the games for the most part, they spen most of the time gabbing to their girlfriends rather than watching the game.

And, my guess is that, if you asked all of the people at a Diamondbacks game what the "infield fly rule" was, less than 5% of them would be able to answer the question.

Or , for that matter, tell you what a fielder's choice or sacrifice fly is.

But, they DO know how to cheer when the organ plays.

DbaxJ · April 15th, 2003, 04:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by WestValleyFan
Johnson is feeling his age, it is obvious. He is still a good pitcher, but he won't be dominating.

This is obvious how? His first start was just that. First starts of the year mean ZERO. His second he had ZERO run support and was DOMINATING. His last start, he had inflammation of his knee, so is that is feeling his age.. ok.

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Schilling will win more than he loses, but overall, he too is showing signs of age..

Showing signs of age too... let me guess... cuz he hasnt a win either right? Hmmm... Of course, he is in the BEST shape of his playing career, and worked harder than he ever did during the offseason, but he's old so count him out.

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Without those two being able to perform as they did in the past two seasons, their pitching staff is, barely, average.

I'll give you that one..

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Offensively, they are old, also.

Lyle Overbay, Chad Moeller, Junior Spivey, T-Mack, Couns, Danny Bautista... well, they are all very aged, I shiver when I think of Gonzo and Finley!

Quote:

It's common knowledge to anyone who understands what has happened, Jerry Colangelo sold out the future of this team for immediate success.

He spent money, which the first couple years he really didnt have, but the new investors took care of that problem, and now that tv revenue is on its way, the selling of the future is not a problem. Also the fact that our minor league system is looking very good lately, we wont have to pull down HUGE contracts to pick up all kinds of FA's when we can use the younger lads coming up through our system.

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He got what he wanted, but now it will be a long time, if at all , that they become competitive, again.

I dont even know where to go on that one.... most likely your a closet Yankee's fan or something....

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And, watch the crowds dwindle, for several reasons. The cost is too high for average fans.

Yes and No. Ticket packages are very reasonable and considering the amount of games that are televised... your not missing out on much. Just depends on how many games you want to go to and where you want to sit as to how much they are. My Mom has season tix and her seats are $9 a piece... thats pretty damn reasonable. My seats are $21 a piece, thats pretty good too, I dont have all the games, but I got what I could afford and I live with that. Its a hell of a lot more games than I had other seasons.

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The corporate people, those who fill the higher priced seats, will begin to dwidle as the team's success drops off, because it won't be the "in" thing anymore, to be at a D-backs game.

Thats quite the observation... were you here for the first season? Thats how the place was then, and they dropped off after that season too... of course if you are winning you sell more tickets and make more money. They kind of go hand in hand that way.

Quote:

Most of the females who , now, attend the games, so they can go to the hairdresser and gab about it to their girlfriends wont want to be there anymore cause , other than the fact that it's cool to be part of a winner, they won't want to be associated with a loser.

And, if you watch these females, at the games for the most part, they spen most of the time gabbing to their girlfriends rather than watching the game.

Who cares?

Quote:

And, my guess is that, if you asked all of the people at a Diamondbacks game what the "infield fly rule" was, less than 5% of them would be able to answer the question.

Or , for that matter, tell you what a fielder's choice or sacrifice fly is.

You are close to 100% correct there, unfortunately thats pretty much the same on these silly little message boards too. I have given explainations many a time about the IFR and other occurances during the game. One does NOT have to know every rule or when it happens or how to score a game to be a fan. That has ZERO relevance at all! Since you brought it up, I will just assume that you know what it is, and thats just fine!!!

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But, they DO know how to cheer when the organ plays.

Yes they do and they are good at it!

Derek in Tucson · April 15th, 2003, 04:28 PM

WestValleyFan is either NEM or his stunt double. I've heard this same tripe out of him for years now, and he uses the same syntax.