On SportsCenter last night they said that the Rays, who are currently in 1st place and have one of the best records in the MLB, only drew 12,000 fans to their game against Toronto. Meanwhile, last April the Lightning, who were terrible, drew 17,000 fans to a meaningless game against Atlanta. Only in Canada would such misplaced priorities be normal, but this is Florida!
I have long thought that no baseball team had worse fans than the Marlins, but the people of Tampa Bay have hit a new low. Can you imagine a WS in Tampa with 12,000 fans in attendance? Of course if the Cubs win the NL their fans will buy up all the remaining tickets, but seriously!
I live in St. Petersburg, the second largest city in the Tampa Bay region (after Tampa) and home of the (Devil) Rays. There are two problems....
1- there are not that many fans of this local baseball team
2- we live in a pretty expansive region with over 3 million people in the immediate few counties that make up the Tampa Bay region, but the team is based in St. Petersburg, which is inconvenient to get to from much of the region for games.
I would like to see the team moved to Tampa. Either near the Raymond James stadium or near downtown Tampa. Unfortunately, there has been a big push to build them a new stadium in St. Pete on the waterfront. Never mind the 20 years remaining on the lease of the Tropicana Field where they play now. The mentality is to build the new stadium. I am against the stadium. It would cost US too much money and ruin our sexy waterfront. The good news is for whatever reason, they have backed off on the waterfront stadium drive. I say move the team to Tampa. I may go to one game a year and it is right here in my little city. I would still go to one game a year if they moved to Tampa, but the benefit would be all the fans from around could actually get to the stadium in a reasonable amount of time. MOVE THE TEAM, let Hillsborough (Tampa) County property owners pay for it. There are fans, they just find it easier to watch the games on TV due to the location of the stadium.
Personally, I am a HUGE hockey fan and yes, I attend many more Lightning games. The Lightning play in Tampa, where the Rays should too, and we have a lot of hockey fans here. We also have a Stanley Cup winning team.
The Rays were losers for so long. I think if this winning streak keeps up, they might gain some attendees, but they would gain many more if they moved to Tampa, win or lose.