Maybe the most obvious headline ever, I know. Then again, how scary would it be if that statement was false? Today, the Indians announced that Saturday’s game against the Reds is officially sold out. It is the first sellout since the home opener. Of course we all remember the crazy number of articles written about the seven games that the park has had under 10,000 patrons in attendance.
No mention that on April 25th, Michael Scott of the Plain Dealer was writing about how up to that point we had rain 17 out of 24 days. If you include March, the Cleveland area had rain 54 out of 61 days. So, you’ll have to excuse me if I want to make a few excuses for a fan-base coming off a year where the team couldn’t crack the 70 win mark.
If you include opening day, the Indians have averaged just over 14,000 through the gates in April. Excluding the opening day outlier it was just over 12,000 for April. In May though, that average has popped to almost 19,500 so far. If you include the same 41,721 for Saturday night against the Reds that puts the Tribe at an average attendance of over in the neighborhood of 25,000 for May assuming a decent showing for tonight’s game.
I guess recovering attendance isn’t a compelling storyline though. Everyone loves to talk about the negatives, but not the positives, I guess. And what a horrible thing to give anyone expectations. Cleveland’s fanbase ends up getting almost punished because they have shown up for games in the past. Meanwhile it seems like Cleveland fans take more flack than an Atlanta fanbase that has been known to fail to sell out playoff games before.
