Anyone else see on Sportscenter...

[AZZenny]

Kurkjian picked us in seven in his column.

 

[AZ Shocker]

the first game isnt sold out yet by some 20 something thousand I believe he said, they even cracked a joke about it.

Why would Sportcenter even make such a comment???

Didn't they notice Chase Field was packed in last weeks playoff series???

What's preventing the Sportcenter guys from thinking the same will happen in this series???

That's how Phoenix works. We always have huge last minute "walk-up" crowds for these types of events.

Oh people (Sportscenter) of little faith. The joint will be packed by 7:30 tonight!

 

[Chris_Sanders]

The game was sold out as of this morning. Much ado about nothing.

 

[Cheesebeef]

The game was sold out as of this morning. Much ado about nothing.

it was? It sure as hell didn't look anything close to sold out when they panned flashing gaping holes in the upper deck just now.

 

[AZ Shocker]

it was? It sure as hell didn't look anything close to sold out when they panned flashing gaping holes in the upper deck just now.

Attendance was 48,142 according to the "boxscore". Chase Field seats 49,000 for baseball. Gaping holes??? Where???

Maybe at the beginning, but after about the 3rd or 4th inning...the place was packed. Abnormally early start than what D-back fans are used too. Took a few innings for people to get there.

 

[AZZenny]

Don't forget they count sold tickets -- that includes blocks nabbed by brokers and scalpers. If they don't sell them at an inflated price, seats go empty. For example, see last season's totally sold-out Sun's games. There were always small blocks of seats scattered around that were empty. There were about 6 seats empty in front of me last Spring, and asking around, I found out the guy was a scalper with season ticket blocks he sold in 2s and 3s.

 

[D-Dogg]

it was? It sure as hell didn't look anything close to sold out when they panned flashing gaping holes in the upper deck just now.

It sure wasn't sold out. Those numbers are BS. Our row and the row in front of us were practically empty. As was many sections in the upper deck.

Silly, really. This is the playoffs, people.

 

[D-Dogg]

Maybe at the beginning, but after about the 3rd or 4th inning...the place was packed. .

No, it wasn't. There were a good 40 seats right around us not sold. And we could see hundreds empty in the uppers on the first base side empty...not empty because people were getting food and drinks, but really, damn empty.

Maybe 39K were there.

 

[HooverDam]

No, it wasn't. There were a good 40 seats right around us not sold. And we could see hundreds empty in the uppers on the first base side empty...not empty because people were getting food and drinks, but really, damn empty.

Maybe 39K were there.

You clearly can't judge crowd numbers. 39K? You think it was 10K short of a full house even though every ticket was sold? Im sure that some of the tickets didn't get resold at a higher price so there were empty seats, but I doubt it was TEN THOUSAND empty seats.

 

[Lefty]

The guys at ESPN(Mike & Mike and Peter Gammons) all believe the call was correct. The question I have is, how come the umps never call this during the regular season?

 

[HooverDam]

The guys at ESPN(Mike & Mike and Peter Gammons) all believe the call was correct. The question I have is, how come the umps never call this during the regular season?

They do. Buster Olney was on 620 this morning and he said, first off, we don't see that many aggressive slides anymore, and when we do see overly aggressive slide, the umps call it. The MLB has been trying to cut down on that sort of thing in the last decade or so.

 

[Lefty]

They do. Buster Olney was on 620 this morning and he said, first off, we don't see that many aggressive slides anymore, and when we do see overly aggressive slide, the umps call it. The MLB has been trying to cut down on that sort of thing in the last decade or so.

I don't recall the Diamondbacks being penalized this year for taking out the fielder at second.

 

[HooverDam]

I don't recall the Diamondbacks being penalized this year for taking out the fielder at second.

There are a bunch of other teams Like I said, its something that doesn't happen as often anymore because the MLB has cracked down on it. Look, it was a close, bang bang call, but on the replay, the ump had it right. I don't see how anyone who isn't wearing Sedona red colored glasses couldn't see that. The ref went w/ the letter of the law and got the call right. Upton shouldn't have put his arm up, he got caught, ah well.

Upton probably also shouldn't have stared down Francis after he was hit by a pitch, which was OBVIOUSLY unintentional. I think Upton just didn't have his head totally in it, was upset and got a bit too aggressive.

 

[D-Dogg]

You clearly can't judge crowd numbers. 39K? You think it was 10K short of a full house even though every ticket was sold? Im sure that some of the tickets didn't get resold at a higher price so there were empty seats, but I doubt it was TEN THOUSAND empty seats.

Maybe not, but some sections were half empty on the first base side uppers. HALF. Easily.

 

[cardsfaithful22]

Yahoo article...

Hello? Any Diamondbacks fans out there?

td.yspwidearticlebody { font-size: 13.5px; }
By Jeff Passan, Yahoo! Sports
October 12, 2007

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PHOENIX – The view from Section 307, Row 40, Seat 13 – the one that not a single person of the four million living in the Phoenix metropolitan area cared to inhabit Thursday night during the biggest baseball game of the Arizona Diamondbacks' season – was quite nice. Take in a few innings from that seat down the right-field line, the field unfolding in an expansive portrait, and the game feels so much more real than TV's microwave-popcorn version of it.
Hector Tapia and Eddie Reyes, sitting three seats down from lucky No. 13, didn't know until 8 a.m. Thursday that they would come to Game 1 of the National League championship series. During homeroom at Summit High, the 18-year-old seniors' teacher told them that because of their perfect attendance this year, each would receive a ticket – face value: $60 – gratis.
"And even then we weren't going to come," Hector said, "but we figured we had free tickets."
The announced attendance for Thursday night's game, a 5-1 victory by the surging Colorado Rockies over the Diamondbacks, was 48,142. A sellout, the Diamondbacks said. Maybe, even with Seat 13 surrounded by thousands of cousins in emptiness during the first pitch, it was. Perhaps every person in Section 307 got caught in the same traffic jam because they had to scramble after the dog ate their tickets. Or it could be that someone bought up all the remaining tickets and gave them away – some, say, to local schools.
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A Diamondbacks spokesman said he did not believe the franchise had bought tickets, though if majority owner Ken Kendrick and his partners did, who could blame them? So much talk leading up to Game 1 focused on the flaccid ticket sales, taking away from the fact that Arizona has built itself up from the 111-loss mess of 2004 to the winningest team in the National League.
Now, on the biggest stage since the Diamondbacks' 2001 World Series championship, the great fans of Phoenix – which is creeping up on Atlanta for most pathetic sports city in America – couldn't bother to watch their team host a division rival hotter than any team since Oakland won 20 straight in 2002.
The Diamondbacks deserve better than this city.
They deserve better fans, too, than some of those who showed up, drank too much and decided to throw bottles on the field after umpire Larry Vanover called interference in the seventh inning on Justin Upton's hard slide into second base, forcing an automatic double play. Plastic bottles – some still heavy with liquid inside – rained onto the outfield grass and warning track, and umpires delayed the game and pulled the Rockies off the field to restore order.
"I'm not scared of plastic bottles," Rockies left fielder Matt Holliday said. "I lift weights for a reason. In case mayhem breaks out at the field and they start throwing stuff, I've got muscles."
Holliday, spared from a direct hit, could kid. The Diamondbacks couldn't. Now they had to apologize for two sets of fans: the handful of idiots who showed up and the thousands of apathetic ones who didn't.
To the right of Seat 13 sat Nick Johnson, Jordan Kaye and Brian Aden, all 9, who had moved up to the $60 seats from their $25 ones. Kaye's father, Sean, came up to check on the kids, and, bless the man, tried to defend the dozens of empties that surrounded him.
"This stadium is huge," Kaye began.
"Give the sense it's a hard ticket to get and people will want it more," he continued.
"Look at everything going on here: Cardinals, Coyotes, preseason Suns, 6-0 (Arizona State football)," he explained.
"We have really good TV numbers," he elucidated.
"We got spoiled going to the playoffs after the second season and winning the World Series after the fourth," he rationalized.
So, he was all right with this.
"Um. OK. I wish there were more fans," Kaye said. "We are the biggest bandwagon fans here."
The biggest shame is that a series dying for exposure – Game 2's East Coast start time: around 10:20 p.m. – can't even sell one of the cities participating. What kind of impression does it give those who might stay up past midnight to watch a game with two unfamiliar teams when the host city pretends like that game barely exists?
On StubHub, the ticket resale site, the lowest price for Game 1 of the ALCS in Boston was $200, the highest $1,730. For Game 3 in Cleveland, the prices were $75 and $1,990. Even for Game 3 in Colorado, which sold out almost immediately, the cheapest went for $85 and the priciest $1,200.
Anyone interested in Game 2 here can get in for $15.90.
And in case a big group wants to go, as of midnight here, blocks of up to 18 tickets were available for Game 2 on MLB.com.
"You'd think the National League championship series would sell out," Holliday said.
Certainly you would, though the Atlanta Braves made a habit of not selling out the NLCS – as recently as 2001, when they faced the Diamondbacks, who, too, couldn't even pack in 40,000 for Game 1 with Randy Johnson starting.
This isn't the Diamondbacks' fault, and it's not Major League Baseball's, either. Sometimes, it's incumbent upon a city to adopt a franchise, and even if the fans chuckle at the public address announcer's imploring fans to chant along to the "Anybody, anytime" catchphrase and roll their eyes at the team's theme song with the chorus "It's a fact, Jack, I back, you back, we back the D'backs," they should support the team by, at very least, showing up.
On the walk back down to the main concourse from Section 307, Row 40, Seat 13, a sign greets those about to leave the stadium.
THE D-BACKS THANK THE BEST FANS IN BASEBALL
Too bad those fans refuse to thank the Diamondbacks in kind.