Orioles attendance so far -- not encouraging

[TradeAngelos]

Yeah, I think so. If the O's get into June and are still .500 ish, and not completely out of the Wild Card... all of the focus around town will not be getting ready for Ravens training camp in July.

The attendence so far matters, but not as much as the tickets already sold for later in the year.

The O's would need to average 28,339 a game from here on out to hit 2.2 million. The only way that is happening is if they are in a battle for the division title with the Yankees and Red Sox for the next 5 months, and even then it is a stetch.

They have not averaged that many per game since 2005, when the economy was on the verge of an explosion.

[O's Fan83]

I know for me, going to Yankee/Red Sox games aren't as enjoyable with the large out of town crowds. It isn't fun to sit there and take trash talk from them, or hear their coordinated cheers, or hear the boos for the hometown team. Charging me up to 30 bucks more for that pleasure certainly makes the decision to go to a different game much easier.

[Woody Held]

Last night there was someone in the stands , distributing business cards to the Orioles fans asking us to visit their website. Their name was "operation orange : pack the yard" and they have a website. Going to the website it is a inticement to sellout the June 3rd game against the Toronto Blue Jays and is sponsered by Pickles pub. The site has three catagories of tickets availble for sale at a discount with links to the Orioles website and a pass code to get the discount.

I guess the neighborhood establishments are starting to take things into their own hands to get more business

[Sports Guy]

The Orioles should know right now how many tickets are going to be sold this year.

Most of the tickets are sold before season starts.

Have gone over this time and time again.

If 2 million is their goal, that tells me that they are under that mark in terms of their internal projections...their hope is that a competitive season will get walk up sales up enough to get to the 2M number.

I would guess they are in the area 1.9M as of right now, in terms of their projections based on tickets already sold and normal averages of walk up sales.

[Woody Held]

I know, talking to my ticket rep, that the series against the Reds and Cardinals already have real good advanced sales.

[glorydays]

I know, talking to my ticket rep, that the series against the Reds and Cardinals already have real good advanced sales.

Cardinal fans travel... expect a lot of Red in the stands.

[glorydays]

My fear is that the fans will not come back even when the team turns the corner.

[apollod]

Orioles attendance is up 5.1% since last year:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/42683786

That said, MLB isn't concerned about attendance because money made in regional tv (MASN, YES, NESN, etc) is more than making up for the lack of attendance:

http://deadspin.com/#!5789875/no-ones-going-to-baseball-games-but-heres-why-mlb-isnt-concerned

[Frobby]

I think those mentioning weather have nailed it. The weather has been AWFUL a lot this April. Just awful. Let's see where attendance stands in a few more weeks.

I feel like I hear this every single year. I don't buy it.

[BaltimoreTerp]

My fear is that the fans will not come back even when the team turns the corner.

Well then we better start preparing for the team to move one day.

[Going Underground]

I think baseball would rather disband two teams.

[NewMarketSean]

My fear is that the fans will not come back even when the team turns the corner.

I don't think that will happen. I don't think we'll sell out every game like we did for a while in the 90's but there's no reason we can't get 30-35K a night if the team is in first place all season.

I also think the O's are going to have to have a winning/exciting season under their belts before the numbers at the gate change drastically. 13 years of losing and being the laughingstock of the league cannot be undone in a couple of months.

[Frobby]

Orioles attendance is up 5.1% since last year:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/42683786

That article is 8 days old. As I said in the OP, attendance is now substantially down from last year. This week last year was also Yankees and Red Sox, and they did much better last year than this one.

[PrivateO]

Like others have alluded to, it wouldn't surprise me if the usual band of Yankees/Sox fans from the New York/Boston areas did not drive down due to rising gas prices.

[Slappy]

That article is 8 days old. As I said in the OP, attendance is now substantially down from last year. This week last year was also Yankees and Red Sox, and they did much better last year than this one.

You compared the first 13 home dates to 2010. 7 of the first 13 in 2010 were weekend games. This year it's only 4 of 13. That makes a difference, no? Average weekend attendance is 7-10k higher than weekday games.