More Rays fans glued to TVs than stadium seats

It could go down as the greatest Rays win that nobody saw, unless fans stayed home on the couch.

It appears they did.

Just 17,009 fans turned out Monday night to witness one for the record books, the first no-hitter in the Tampa Bay Rays' history. It was the smallest crowd of any Major League Baseball game that night.

Even a ballgame between the middling Blue Jays and cellar-dwelling Baltimore Orioles drew more, luring 17,422 fans in Toronto.

But the rest of the story may be happening in Bay area living rooms where the Rays' television ratings are up more than 70 percent from a year ago. Monday's rating was one of the stronger nights so far this season.

For the Rays, who are in the hunt for a new stadium, people in seats matter.

While the Rays' foe, the Detroit Tigers, don't bring 'em out to the ballpark like the Yankees or Red Sox, the year-to-date attendance is down slightly from last year. The Rays have averaged 21,939 fans through their first 47 home games - good for 24th out of 30 teams.

Just ahead of the Rays at No. 23: the aforementioned Orioles, who've lost two games for every game they've won and sit comfortably at the bottom of the baseball standings.

Everyone seems to have a reason for the Rays' attendance problems, whether it's the economy, Tropicana Field's location or too few major corporations in the Bay area.

To Donny Rhode, a Tampa man who was perusing the Rays' downtown Tampa ticket store Tuesday, it's the Rays' legacy of losing under its previous owners and the fact the Trop is so far from major employment centers in Tampa.

To father-son combo Mike and Joe Albano, it's the time it takes to get to and from games. What corporation is going to buy season tickets and hand them out to clients if they won't get home until 11:30 at night? Mike Albano said.

The Rays have won praise for some innovative efforts to lure crowds. Its weekend post-game concerts have been a hit, as has its policy of allowing people to bring munchies into the ballpark. A spokesman for the Rays was not immediately available Tuesday.

Meantime, for all its struggles at the ticket window, the Rays are scoring on the airwaves.

The number of eyeballs focused on Rays TV broadcasts are up 72 percent over last year, said Amy Pempel, spokeswoman for Fox's Sun Sports network.

Through 89 games played this season, the Rays are averaging a 5.57 rating, which translates into 100,583 households in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area. That's up from the 3.24 rating average (58,580 households) last year, Pempel says. Each rating point represents 1 percent of the TV homes in the Tampa-St. Petersburg TV market.

"We're clearly delivering value to both our viewers and sponsors as the Rays are quickly becoming the Tampa Bay area's version of must-see TV," said Steve Liverani, Sun Sports' senior vice president and general manager.

"This team competes in what is arguably the best division in baseball and are proving they can compete with anybody."

Monday night's game garnered a 7.5 rating, meaning 135,000 households watched Matt Garza's no-hitter.

Since the mid-2000s, the Rays actually have seen impressive growth in home-game attendance. In its woeful 2005 season, when the team chalked up 67 wins and 95 losses, the Rays attracted just 14,094 fans per home game for the whole season, according to figures the team presented to the ABC Coalition, a community group that is recommending a new ballpark for the team.

But, the momentum seems to have died out, even though the Rays have the second best record in baseball after the Yankees. Last year, the Rays drew 23,473 fans a game through 47 home games, about 1,500 more than the team's drawing this year, according to an updated attendance tracker on TBO.com.

The old adage that people would come as soon as the Rays started winning isn't proving true, said Rhode, the fan in downtown Tampa. Winning may help a club draw more fans than if it loses, but nothing more.

"Winning helps, but that's not the only thing," Rhode said.