Wake Up Houston!

Hello Astros fans, wherever you are.  Judging from the stands this weekend, it's not Minute Maid Park.  (I'm sorry if that sounds too much like Bob Uecker in Major League, it just always comes to mind.)  This is the plight of being a baseball fan in football territory.

At one point on Saturday I thought I was going to write about witnessing in person the final nail in the coffin.  The A's went up 6-3, and I had texted to my mom "game over, season over."  It was bleak.  But then the bats came alive.  A pinch-hit RBI double by Matt Duffy, his first major league hit.  Gattis' go-ahead 3-run home run in the 7th.  Max Stassi's first major league home run in the 8th.  The Astros breathed new life into their season, or at least kept hopes alive for another day, and all I could think was, too bad no one was there to see it.

Am I the only one around here who does not understand why weekend games in the last month of a playoff push are not sold out?  And not only sold out, but the bottom bowl was at least 1/3 empty and the top at least 1/2.  And this on a bobble head give away day?  I don't care if it's NCAA or NFL game day.  These Astros' games are much more important, especially since we haven't been this close to the playoffs in a decade.

Where are the people?  Official attendance on Friday was 27,567; on Saturday 27,044; and on Sunday 22,453.  Minute Maid holds 41,500 people.  Those numbers are pathetic.  I remember making fun of the Braves in the 90s for not selling out playoff and World Series games.  The Astros would probably do the same this year, and you cannot blame playoff fatigue for sure.

I know a lot of people will blame ticket prices.  To a certain extent I will agree, especially given the cheapest face value this weekend was over $20, and next weekend with the Rangers is over $24.  But keep in mind, football tickets start at around $60 or $80.  People, for some reason, are more than willing to fork out those prices for seats where you can't even see the field, for a sport better witnessed on TV than in person.  Baseball, on the other hand, is always better in person.  Stadiums in other areas of the country are even more expensive, but they sell out.  When at Royals games this summer, some had tickets starting at $80, and those were sold out.  You cannot tell me Royals fans are that much more wealthy than Astros fans.  Are you going to blame them on being on TV?  Well that was 2 years ago now.  Fans have been able to watch the most exciting team in baseball on TV for 2 years, so stop using that excuse.

To me it all comes down to one thing, Houstonians are fair-weather fans.  Yes, they came out in the late 90s and early 00s when the Astros were winning, but again they were winning.  As soon as the team turned south nobody showed up.  Houston has never been at the top of attendance records in baseball, even when they were winning.  The all-time attendance record for the Astros, just over 3 million in 2004, makes them 19th out of 30 teams.  In 1998, arguably the best season in Astros history, they drew less than 2.5 million, which was 15th in the league.  Even in 1986, the heyday of the Astros, they were 14th in the league.

So what am I trying to say?  I hate being a baseball fan in football country.  I try to talk about the best sport in the world, and people laugh and just want to talk about a game where the majority of the time is commercials or being standing around.  An Australian football sports writer last week watched Monday Night Football and said the same thing.  I don't want this to become another football-bashing report, just saying.  I really wish more Houstonians would jump on the bandwagon and support this young and exciting team.  Otherwise the team in the 4th largest city in America will continue to be a small market team.