Crowd Attendance

[jww83 0]

Obviously living in Australia I can't attend any games, but I do get to see at least 2 live games a week and a few delayed games aswell on tv or over the net. One thing that I have noticed is that the crowd attendance seems to be really poor at almost all the games I've been watching.

Has crowd attendance dropped significantly? Or is there a reason why the seats opposite the main camera are always empty in the lower section of the stands?

I'm an avid stars and rangers fan and a lot of the games I've seen in Dallas have seemed like the there is nobody there (atleast on the side visible by the tv camera) yet the commentators regularly mention good crowd numbers. This obvious presence of empty lower seats can be seen in pretty much every game I see on tv. Has anyone else noticed this? Is there an explanation?

[DarkStar50 679]

I noticed the same thing in Dallas the other night when watching on Center Ice. It was empty at the start of the game and filled in a bit by second period. What is going on in Dallas?

The Devils rink always looks like this. Now they want to add more money to tickets to cover outside security costs!! Way to shaft the fan.

MSG is all corporate down low and $$$$$. The Rangers are sold out for the season, right #96?

[jestrs 0]

The talk around Dallas is the Cowboys. Football is number one in the south.

The lack of change of player personnel has hurt the Stars attendance. The Dallas area is tired of good regular seasons and then out in the first round.

[pisani34 10]

rexall place in edmonton i believe is sold out every game, but we do only have a capacity of less than 17K as well

[chippa13 1844]

For many cities, the NHL attendance picks up after the New Year. Usually once the NFL is winding down the NHL is winding up.

[jww83 0]

The talk around Dallas is the Cowboys. Football is number one in the south.

The lack of change of player personnel has hurt the Stars attendance. The Dallas area is tired of good regular seasons and then out in the first round.

Yeah I supose it is a bit like that. The years that from what I gather there was a waiting list for Stars season ickets (which was also around the time of their stanley cup) did also coincide with the cowboys sucking. Now they are a top NFL team and the stars have put up a number of cosecutive mediocre seasons (when including post seasons) then it only makes sense their attendance be down.

Just out of curiosity since its too hard to tell from the tv, what percentage of the stadium is filled on average at stars games? Is it as bad as it looks on tv?

[brettlynch11 0]

joe louis in detroit usually doesnt fill....

my sister and i snuck down to seats on the glass, and the people didnt come

[Chadd 916]

Here are the official numbers:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/attendance?year=2008

Funny thing is that this shows Nashville at more than 14k for the season yet TSN said they are averaging less than 13k.

[hellaavangard 33]

The talk around Dallas is the Cowboys. Football is number one in the south.

The lack of change of player personnel has hurt the Stars attendance. The Dallas area is tired of good regular seasons and then out in the first round.

Yeah I supose it is a bit like that. The years that from what I gather there was a waiting list for Stars season ickets (which was also around the time of their stanley cup) did also coincide with the cowboys sucking. Now they are a top NFL team and the stars have put up a number of cosecutive mediocre seasons (when including post seasons) then it only makes sense their attendance be down.

Just out of curiosity since its too hard to tell from the tv, what percentage of the stadium is filled on average at stars games? Is it as bad as it looks on tv?

I've only been to two games this season (Calgary and Montreal) and it wasn't too bad. I think there was a lot of interest earlier in the fall with Modano chasing the US points record, but I don't remember thinking the turnout was poor when I was there. I was watching the Phoenix game the other night and also noticed the absence of people in the lower section at the beginning, but I think part of it is that that game was on Vs. and started at 6pm Dallas time, an hour earlier than normal. It probably took people longer to get to the arena, which is right off of I-35, which is basically a parking lot at that time of day.

I went to several games last season, and aside from the playoff one I attended, the NYR, All-Star, and Pittsburgh games all had high attendance, but I think partly because those are two teams that we don't get to see often, and the superstar contingent.

The Stars do need some new faces, especially a high scoring superstar that can get the fans excited again. That and Dallas being 2nd in the league right now will hopefully help

[frankie56 0]

Look at the penguins away numbers. They sell out everywhere they go.

[li7039 0]

The Rangers are sold out for the season

[Langenbrunner15 0]

The Devils rink always looks like this. Now they want to add more money to tickets to cover outside security costs!! Way to shaft the fan.

The club seats are 95% sold out. All corporations own them, many people are either up in the lounge eating or the goal bar. Either way, the seats are still sold. And the Devils attendance is still up from last year. I was reading some where that they have the largest attendance rise from last year that any other team. The very upper deck is also filled almost every night. But, it is bull how newark put another $5 dollars on the tickets from the already expensive tickets.

[cxo 0]

Man I watched the early game on Vs. between the Islanders and some other team I don't care about, and I could almost count how many people were sitting in the lower bowl. I haven't seen attendance that poor visually in a long time. I thought Joe Louis Arena was bad.

[troy 12]

It was against the Flyers and there was a big snow/ice storm in Long Island that day.

[cxo 0]

I knew who they were playing.