Rays continue winning in front of empty seats

If you win, they will come.

Or will they?

Twenty-one games into the season, the Tampa Bay Rays sit in an unfamiliar spot - alone atop the standings with the best record in Major League Baseball.

Attendance, though, has so far followed an all-too-familiar trend: near the bottom of the standings.

According to MLB statistics, the Rays rank 19th out of 30 teams in attendance this year.

On Tuesday night, the Rays drew 10,825 fans, which was the smallest crowd to see the Rays play at Tropicana Field this season.

Until Wednesday, that is. Only 10,691 fans showed up to see the Rays improve to 16-5.

It's true the series was against the Oakland Athletics, who have a minimal following in the Bay area, and the two games of the series were held midweek.

Still, it's hard to discount the reality that the team with the best record in baseball sometimes can't fill a third of its stadium. Tropicana Field has a capacity of nearly 37,000.

Relief pitcher Lance Cormier said players know the crowds will be smaller on weekdays.

"The support, we get it for the weekends," Cormier said. "It's just the middle of the week games. It's tough. I understand that a lot of people have to work and everything."

Even before the Oakland series, the Rays mostly were playing before thousands of empty seats each game. In the previous home series against Toronto, after the team just got back from winning nine games on a 10-game road trip, the Rays averaged only about 23,000 fans.

And that was with a series that included two weekend games, one of which featured a postgame concert.

The team's attendance is coming under a microscope more than ever this year because of rumblings about whether the Rays might eventually move to a new stadium, possibly in Hillsborough County. Rays officials say they don't think they'll ever be able to draw enough fans to Tropicana Field.

On Wednesday, several hours before the Rays beat Oakland again, team President Matt Silverman appeared at a St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce luncheon, one of many ways the team is trying to pitch for corporate support. The chamber, one of the area's most visible business organizations, was enthusiastic about the team and its performance this year, but Silverman notes that that the low attendance comes in large part because the team has had trouble selling season tickets to large businesses.

Corporations traditionally drive season ticket sales, and sales to corporations could drive crowd numbers from the 10,000-plus area into the 15,000 and 20,000 range, and closer to the league average of 30,000, he said.

To increase corporate sales, the Rays have opened an office in Tampa to reach out to businesses on that side of Tampa Bay, Silverman said.

"For this team to succeed and thrive, we're going to need businesses across the region to support this club and provide the revenues to match the other 29 teams in baseball," Silverman said.

A new stadium is critical to building attendance, said Silverman. He noted that Minneapolis, which just built a new stadium, witnessed not only increased attendance when the stadium opened, but also in the years leading up to the opening.

A civic group that has studied the issue of a new stadium is recommending any one of three general locations - two in Tampa and one in mid-Pinellas County. The group does not think Tropicana Field, which is in downtown St. Petersburg, is a viable option.

The Tuesday opener of the series against Oakland marked the 15th anniversary of the day the team - then known as the Devil Rays - signed a 30-year contract to play in its current location.

Silverman declined to weigh in on any of the three recommended stadium options, but he agreed with the group's observation that a 30-minute drive time in a region was optimal, and such a drive puts downtown St. Petersburg out of the running as a possible new location.

For now, Silverman is relishing the team's success on the field and hoping it would help attendance.

"It's a great start to the season and it's one the fans are starting to get behind," Silverman said. "We hope we get a little bit of a tailwind going with the support to get this club going."

Some evidence of that tailwind support can be seen in television ratings, a bright spot when it comes to fan interest. A spokeswoman for Sun Sports says ratings are up 70 pecent from last year.

After sweeping Oakland in their two-game series, the Rays take on the Kansas City Royals today in the first game of what will be a four-game series. Plenty of seats are still available.