Pittsburgh fans walkout?

[mbuser]

Maybe they could use attendance as a factor in revenue sharing. For every percentage point under max capacity for a season you loose an amount of revenue sharing. Bad team = lower attendance = less money.

not sure that will really get to the heart of it. as mak1277 alluded to, they basically treat the franchise like a minor league team and keep the focus off the field itself. as a result, they get their 15k-20k because of a schedule full of booblehead/calendar/poster/lapel pin/miniature bat/labotomizer giveaways and plenty of fireworks nights. the 'thinking fan' no longer attends games, but they draw families and casual fans looking for a night out. basically they just tread water while the welfare checks roll in

[sandman042]

i havent heard anything oin this did the fans actually walk out or no?

[EWSPECIALTY]

i heard about 100 or so fans walked out.

[wrveres]

I have read about 100 actually walked out at the end of the third inning while being boooed by the crowd. They returned to their seats shortly there after.
The papers also estimated about 1000-2000 walked out during the 7th inning stretch, and only half of them returned to their seats.

[PlayingWithFire]

weak

[bigh0rt]

Despite a much-publicized effort to display fan discontent during the Pittsburgh Pirates’ 15th consecutive losing season, only a few thousand fans at most left their seats in protest following the third inning of Saturday night’s game against Washington.

Only about 100 fans were seen leaving the ballpark immediately following the third, and it appeared that many of the fans who vacated their seats returned not long after leaving.
...
Fans unhappy with the club were asked to wear green shirts, but many who did stayed in their seats. Efforts by some spectators to start a derisive chant about the Pirates’ ownership failed, and some fans booed those green-shirted fans who left their seats.
...
The protest effort may have been harmed by an unlikely source—the Pirates’ offense. One of the majors’ lowest-scoring teams scored six runs in the second inning to take a 6-1 lead only an inning before the walkout fizzled out.

Yahoo! | FULL STORY

[orange12]

That is weak. So those protesters wanted to protest but weren't willing to waste their money on only three innings. Sounds like they wanted to have their cake and eat it too. The whole Pirates organization is screwed.

[AussieDodger]

There is a twinkle of light at the end of the tunnel. If someone buys them , they start their rotation Snell-Gorzelanny. And then end the game with Capps. All very young. A lot of teams don't have that.

[mbuser]

There is a twinkle of light at the end of the tunnel. If someone buys them , they start their rotation Snell-Gorzelanny. And then end the game with Capps. All very young. A lot of teams don't have that.

they'd have to be for sale for someone to buy them...

yeah overall the execution was a bit less than i was hoping for, but the whole process of getting to this point at least stirred up things a bit. what is unfortunate is that it seems a lot of the casual fans (who turned up for bob walk bobblehead night) thought the protest was directed towards the players, hence the boos. by the way, pittsburgh post-gazette estimates were that 1,000 people participated. i wonder if the thing would have gone down differently if the buccos had been down 6-1 instead of up by the same score at the time

go buccos