Pirates Nearing Major League Lead in Apathy
In Major League Baseball, only the diehard fans come out for moribund teams’ late September games. Look at any set of baseball highlights on this morning’s SportsCenter and you will see far more empty seats than homers.↵↵But Pirates fans are currently doing that vanishing act well enough to earn (?) Lebanon comparisons. From a report about yesterday’s game: ↵
↵↵⇥10:31 a.m.: Welcome to Beirut. There is absolutely no one in the vicinity of anything on the Downtown perimeter. No cars, taxes, buses, nothing other than those helicopters buzzing overhead. Downtown itself is much the same right now, just super, super quiet except for the police offers talking amongst each other. At any rate, we begin the day with the scene around Honus. One staff guy, two people waiting for a bus and a stadium worker crossing the street.↵⇥↵⇥12:43 p.m.: There is almost nobody here.↵⇥
↵⇥↵⇥2:03 p.m.: The place actually has added a few patrons in the past hour or so. Probably up to about 2,000 in the house, if I had to hazard a guess.↵⇥
↵↵↵Now, as a Floridian, I’ve heard stories from both Marlins and Rays fans about similarly sparse turnouts, and they make sense. South Florida summers are not conducive to baseball games, and by the time September rolls around, the Marlins either have a full or empty bandwagon; the Rays were just not worth the afternoon or evening before last year. ↵
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↵But these Pirates have averaged over 20,000 fans every year since PNC Park opened, though, charitably, they haven't been very good for the duration. The upper deck being closed yesterday is a first, despite reports earlier this year of shrinking crowds. And don't blame the economy, at least not traditionally: The Steel City's 6.5 percent unemployment rate is lower than the national average, but one of the possible draws in Pittsburgh this week is the G20 meeting in town, which, of course, is an event perfectly tailored to Pirates fans. (No, it's not.) (Editor's note: For the record, we aren't disputing things are ugly in Pittsburgh for the G20 and it's making people uncomfortable when it comes to going out, but their weekday attendance is generally weak, G20 or not. This promotion could've just as easily happened this week as the beginning of the month.)↵
↵↵It seems that the Pirates’ plummeting attendance is simply a matter of fans smartly staying away from PNC. It’s almost heroic, resisting the powerful lure of the the mashing done by Garrett Jones (20 HRs in 72 games), Andrew McCutchen (52 RBI), and Delwyn Young (.262 batting average), or the mound mastery of Ross Ohlendorf (3.92 ERA) and Joel Hanrahan (1.47 WHIP as a reliever). Either that, or it’s too hard to hop off the Steelers’ and Penguins’ bandwagons and get to Pirates games. ↵
↵↵(H/T to Big League Stew)↵
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This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.
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