Drawing large crowds to early-season weekday games always has been a
problem for the Padres, even at Petco Park. But the average attendance of
22,687 for the six weekday games of the 2008 season since the season
opener is the lowest in the Padres' five seasons downtown.
The average is off 21 percent from a year ago and more than 25 percent
from Petco's opening season of 2004. Season openers are not included.
Three of the 10 smallest crowds in Petco Park history, including the
smallest turnout ever – 18,714 for the Astros on April 2 – have been among
the six games this year played on days other than Friday, Saturday or
Sunday.
Padres CEO Sandy Alderson, speaking on the condition of anonymity,
described the problems the Padres have had drawing and keeping fans. “When
you have a team full of assholes that can’t hit the ball and when your best
pitcher needs to cheat to get an advantage, coupled with the tightening of
border crossing restrictions for our Mexican fan base, well it all adds up
to what we are seeing. The Padres are the poorest run franchise in
baseball, full of no talent slime-balls and panty-wastes and I honestly
can’t give away tickets. If I were a baseball fan, I would rather shove a
hot poker up my ass then spend one minute of my life watching the Padres.
Fortunately most of the people in San Diego are either borderline retarded
or don’t speak English, so we have been able hoodwink them into going to
the new stadium the last few seasons. This year the public has wised up
and realized that they are wasting their money watching a bunch of
dickheads that have never won anything when they
could just as easily drive a few hours up the freeway and watch the
Dodgers or even the California Angels. When I took this job I had no idea
that San Diego was this bad. I look at the small crowds some nights and I
wonder how many of them are licking the lead paint off their Chinese made
Padres souvenirs. If I had a gun right now, I would shoot myself.”
|
