Spring Training Attendance: Some Up, Some Down

TAMPA - On a sunny, breezy Saturday morning at Legends Field, the Rays and Yankees prepared to play a spring training baseball game. An anticipated sellout crowd flowed into the stadium.

Sam Osmond, a Brandon resident and Newfoundland native wearing a white Yankees jersey and blue Yankees cap, walked up to the empty ticket window 90 minutes before game time.

And bought a ticket for a lower-level seat.

"I could have gone online last night and gotten it, I guess, but I didn't think about it," Osmond said. "I figured I could just buy one when I got here Saturday morning."

Osmond unknowingly took a bigger chance than he thought.

Even though overall attendance is down this year for spring training games in Florida, many of the teams that train in the Tampa Bay area have experienced a slight increase in attendance, two-thirds of the way through the Grapefruit League schedule.

"Just from what I've seen and what I've heard, there's not a sharp decrease by any means, overall," said Nick Gandy of the Florida Sports Foundation, which oversees the Florida Grapefruit League Association. "It looks pretty healthy up to now."

Occasionally, late-arriving fans like Osmond have been out of luck at Tampa Bay area ballparks. Of the 75 games played through Sunday at the eight sites in Hillsborough, Pinellas, Polk, Manatee and Sarasota counties, 21 (28 percent) were official sellouts.

Eight of those sellouts occurred at Legends Field, where the Yankees remain Florida's biggest spring training draw at 10,643 fans per game, and have drawn the three largest crowds in Legends Field history, including a record 11,036 Monday for Red Sox-Yankees.

Through Sunday, 12 of the 18 teams that hold spring training in Florida had experienced a drop in average attendance from 2007. Of the six teams averaging more fans than last year, four - the Yankees (Tampa), Tigers (Lakeland), Blue Jays (Dunedin) and Indians (Winter Haven) - play in the Tampa Bay area.

The Rays (St. Petersburg), Phillies (Clearwater), Pirates (Bradenton) and Reds (Sarasota) have been more in line with the statewide downturn in spring training attendance.

After setting a record in 2007 with 1.716 million fans in 275 games (6,243 per game), Florida's 18 teams were averaging 6,029 fans in 174 games through Sunday.

The Rays, playing their final season in St. Petersburg before moving to Charlotte County in 2009, have averaged 4,708 fans this year, a 4.7-percent drop from 2007 (4,940).

The Grapefruit League surpassed the 1 million mark in attendance Sunday (1,049,049), with two weeks remaining before Opening Day.

Meanwhile, the 12 teams that train in Arizona are on pace to break last year's spring training attendance record of 1.25 million.

While Gandy acknowledged that a nationwide economic downturn and higher gas prices might have contributed to the 3.4-percent drop this year in Grapefruit League attendance, he said that as early as October, indications were that the state would enjoy a strong showing after consecutive years of record spring training attendance.

"I said before the season started that based on the inquiries that I received from our Web sites and people calling up, I had more inquiries this year than any of the previous years," Gandy said. "There seemed to be a lot more interest. Whether or not people are following through and coming to Florida, it's hard to tell."