Saturday Will Reveal An Important Number
August 20th, 2010
Joe can’t wait to sit out in the rain with his binoculars during the blacked out preseason home opener on Saturday, probably sitting next to some freaky drunk old woman who will get way to touchy feely with him.
Of course, Joe is being sarcastic. It’s going to stink being out there sweating like a soaked manbeast getting rain in his $8 beer. But such is life when rebuilding meets recession.
While Joe will have his eyes on the game and his Twitter mechanism in hand (and reporting here like a madman immediately following the game), Joe will be keeping his eye on one statistic to emerge. That would be the attendace figure for the game.
Since the old Tampa Stadium was demolished, every Bucs game has been just about the same reported “sold out” attendance, close to 65,00o, give or take a little.
Now it was obvious that Team Glazer or somebody else was eating tickets to reach that number last year and avoid a television blackout. (Thank you, whoever you are.) But this season, it seems that’s not going to happen. Hence the blackouts.
So the reported attendance number on Saturday should be the first indicator of just how far the Bucs need to go to sell out a regular season game. Joe can’t see a reason why Saturday’s number would be fudged.
If Joe had to hazard a guess, he’d put Saturday’s official number at 44,001.
August 20th, 2010 at 8:14 am
Pssh, you’re way off: 42,784 😉
August 20th, 2010 at 8:22 am
I don’t think saturday will give an indication of how the regular season will go…
I do know we’ve all been missing football – and that might skew the number.
If they show, play well and even win… That will go a long way to getting those seats filled.
I am ready for some football people.
August 20th, 2010 at 8:28 am
49,500
August 20th, 2010 at 9:18 am
I know that there will be two fans there Joe. Lets hit up the party deck for a nice cold one what do you say?
August 20th, 2010 at 9:30 am
49,501 Bob.
August 20th, 2010 at 9:40 am
I think its going to be more like 44,002.
August 20th, 2010 at 9:42 am
If you would just opt for the Luxury Box seats, then you wouldn’t get wet and the beer, wine and food is all you can eat. In fact the game is also on TV, not blacked out.
Anyone care to join Ari and crew???
August 20th, 2010 at 10:00 am
Everyone is throwing around theories left and right about attendance for the Bucs. It is not that complicated:
-Prices are high
-PSLs
-Price of parking, beers, etc…
-IT IS HOT
-I have a big HD TV at home in air conditioning
-They are rebuilding (aka losing)
-The ecomony in Tampa has sucked for 3 years and almost 15% of the polutaion has been unemployed
-hence the dicretionary income is not there
I have a good job, but have not had a raise in 4 years and have been busy paying down debt and saving some money up. Dolling out $2000 + for a pair of season tickets just isn’t in the cards anymore.
I will still go to two games: one with friends and one with my son, but I did not renew the season tickets and never plan to again.
As far as the “rebuilding” point, that does not affect me. I am enjoying watch them build from scratch and want to see how they progress. it is all about money.
Every league (NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA) have priced themselves beyond reason and most people just can not afford it anymore.
The NFL needs to rethink this blackout rule though. It does not work. It might have 30 years ago when tickets were $5-$10, but not now. I will watch the away games and other teams and get caught up online. It sucks, but that’s the way it goes. I can not see how a blackout is going to make someone decide to go spend well over $150 for parking, food, a beer, and tickets for 2. Not when I have the 60″ HD and 500 other channels and a computer… and a beach and a golf course, etc…
August 20th, 2010 at 10:04 am
Dave:
The blackout rule is perhaps an archaic rule. This was concocted before there were sports bars, before there was DirecTV, before there was a Red Zone Channel, before there was HD.
Now, blackouts may help the NFL as a whole, but it will kill a home team. People will still watch football, it just won’t be the Bucs.
Joe has no inside knowledge, but it wouldn’t be a surprise that in the near future, for, say $50 a game, you can watch home blacked out games live online.
August 20th, 2010 at 10:15 am
I pay $300+ to watch the Bucs on the Sunday Ticket – of course I live 1,300 miles from Tampa. I can see paying maybe $25 or even $30 for pay per view of blacked out games but $50? That’s kind of steep.
I wonder if the $8 beers will still be $8 this year?
August 20th, 2010 at 10:20 am
How much do you wanna bet that those blacked out home games, that no one sees, are the games where Raheem and Co make the MOST progress? Hmmmm?
August 20th, 2010 at 10:27 am
People don’t mind paying the price of the ticket iteself , it’s all the extra costs they know they will incur that discourages them.
Parking is another 25 dollars , at least. Then , if going with a family of 4 , by the time you buy food and drink for the kids , plus a couple beers for yourself , you are looking at one expensive-ass Sunday.
Now with HDTV , sunday ticket , etc ….it’s not so bad an option just to stay home…in fact most times it seems like the BETTER option.
We have a simple case of a product pricing itself out of the market. No idiotic black-out is going to solve that. The only way to fix it is to either lower prices , or increase demand ( you increase demand by providing a better product , WINNING)
By the way, Joe brings up a good point. I’m suprised black-out games aren’t offered on a pay-per-view basis already…
August 20th, 2010 at 10:28 am
Larry:
You are correct but if the NFL allowed people to watch the blacked out game for $30 at home (cheaper than a ticket) what incentive would there be for fans to go to the stadium? Yeah, $50 on face value is steep. But if you factor in parking, concessions and the price of a ticket, $50 isn’t so bad.
August 20th, 2010 at 10:36 am
My guess is 24,000. My income is down 90%, I can’t afford to spend $400 (tickets, food, drink & parking) for my family to sit in the nose bleed seats. Last time we went, we couldn’t see the on field action and we were highly offended by the Nazi displays of militarism. There were military fly overs, some kind of halftime enlistment program and soldiers in uniform everywhere. All that was missing was the feuhrer on the Jumbo Tron. Maybe now, they will be featuring some PSA’s from British Petroleum telling us the benefits of eating blackened seafood. I like football but don’t treat me like a moron.
August 20th, 2010 at 10:37 am
50 dollars isnt steep at all. Think about it , you could get together with 5 buddies and pay 10 bucks a piece ….that is super cheap.
August 20th, 2010 at 10:55 am
I have to agree with Radio, even two guys splitting it would be more than worth it! Joe, I’m saying they’ll report 40K+, but I think 25-30K in actuality will show up for the game. Wish I was there to go, love night games at the CITS!
August 20th, 2010 at 10:58 am
The whole $8 beer argument is ill-conceived. If you simply look at the size of those beers (roughly 24oz.), you’ll see that they are twice the size of a bottle of beer.
So that brings it to $4 per 12 oz beer (equal to a standard size can/bottle of beer).
If you were at a sports bar, a bottle of crappy domestic Duff Beer would cost about $3. A dollar tip brings it to $4.
The price isn’t as inflated as you believe….
August 20th, 2010 at 11:23 am
Fire Greg Olson!
Bucs only sell 16 oz. beers. The Rays have 24, but not Bucs. Large drafts last year actually went down a quarter, but they went from 20 ounces to 16 ounces. I used to sneak them in, but it isn’t as easy now that they pat you down.
August 20th, 2010 at 12:26 pm
@ FGO
You can get a 9 pack of Miller Lite 16 oz cans for $10, so yeah, the beer prices are pretty damn high. Of course, that’s piss beer in comparison to Caybrew right Joe?
August 20th, 2010 at 12:46 pm
lol… I haven’t seen a caybrew reference around here in a while……………..
August 20th, 2010 at 3:11 pm
Apparently people do ” mind paying the price of the ticket iteself” as people aren’t buying tickets. And outside the stadium tickets never go for face value.
$65-75-85 For the West Side nosebleeds.
“we were highly offended by the Nazi displays of militarism.”
Only two things scare me world peace and carnies! Nazi – oh my!
August 20th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Yeah Joe, how come you won’t let us comment back to ole Miguel and his idiotic “Nazi” statements?
August 20th, 2010 at 4:16 pm
24 0z is being generous…I’d guess they are more like 18-20 ounces.
It’s highway robbery what they charge for Beer….for ALL the concessions , actually…
August 21st, 2010 at 6:45 am
Joe, I think that’s a pretty optimistic number (almost 2/3rds full). My guess is low 30’s.
August 21st, 2010 at 11:49 pm
@ Miguel Grande
Take your “Nazi” views back across the border you came from freeloader!
August 23rd, 2010 at 10:59 pm
Damn, I was pretty close 😉