Oh 100% just keeping y’all in the loop from what I’m seeing in case others aren’t paying attention. SC and Arkansas pitching are not great.
Really? How many students do you actually see attend softball - very few unless it’s a boyfriend of a player. Record or go on demand to any of our televised games and you will see 10-25 empty seats in the TV camera view. You never see that at FSU or Bama or Auburn, too many old season ticket holders who don’t attend games and either have no idea how to sell their tickets or can’t be bothered to sell them. This is why I hope they monetize softball like they did gymnastics and then people who buy seats behind the plate will sit in the seats or will know how to sell them. As to the line around the corner- they were giving away Gator friendship bracelets to the first 1000 fans and they lined up to get primo berm seating.
Well, the only thing I would disagree with that....FSU cut down their seating with that absurd platform stuff on the third base line. I always see a ton of empty seats at Auburn. Granted, not so much at Bama.
Yes, this is way off-topic. Sue me. Todd Golden is the next Billy D. I have been saying it for two years.
I fully agree we need more butts in the seats and I would like to see a better mix of younger fans, although I don't think it is terrible. When you pan the crowd past behind home plate there is a pretty decent mix. 2500 for the first game is on par with what A&M drew for our series there and is not far off from what Oklahoma drew for the USC series. Oklahoma's numbers from last year were an aberration due to the incentive for the new stadium. And, btw, although I would have to be there to observe the real effect of the stadium and the amenities, I'm not simply blown away by OU's new stadium. Main seating is not that dissimilar from ours. They pack the outfield stands. But it looks compact and a definite home field advantage. Texas' stadium sucks. I think it holds something like 1500 and is a glorified high school stadium.
I gave Texas too much credit for their capacity. Opening in 1998 at a cost of $4.5 million, the stadium seats 1,254 and is named after university benefactor Red McCombs and his wife Charline. It features a clay infield and a grass outfield.[2] Texas later added a 4,400-square foot training facility along the left-field line, completed in 2009.[3].
Statistics say whatever you want them to say. Our "average" attendance is lower than several others. But it is a reflection of how many crap games we play in February with 1100 in the stands. Tennessee, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas and many others simply don't play that many games like that. Our weather is a plus and a curse. It kills our average but is not a reflection of how close we are to most everyone else once the real games begin.
In a very classy move, the KSP scoreboard is lit up tonight with a full screen tribute to UF basketball winning the SEC tournament title.
My seats always have someone in them. I have never failed to have them filled. I sell them at cost and I have never fail to find a Gator fan not to have purchased them, no matter the opponent. So if you can’t make the game go to any of the Gator softball social media sites and let them know. I usually can sell them within hours. I agree with letting the stadium seats be filled after the second inning if the ticket holders do not show up. I think it is very classy and it also shows up better on TV. I am always in my seat about 15 minutes before first pitch and as I understand from my ticket holders, they want to find my seats they have purchased and see what they paid for. They are always satisfied, usually extremely satisfied. They always get to the seats early and before first pitch.
I've always advocated -- if your tickets are not scanned at the gate OR put into the UF resale portal for XX percentage of the games, you lose the seat next year. There are often a dozen people who sit OUTSIDE the fence --never understood that as tickets are pretty cheap. OTOH, I did watch most of the Covid season standing on a chair next to a tree outside the fence.
I like it. 50% seems like a reasonable place to start, and go from there. UF is getting their ticket money either way, and make nothing on the secondary market sales, so they probably don't care. Would probably boost concessions a few dollars and look a lot better on tv, for the games they choose to broadcast They definitely have some systems in place to take tickets away. They tried to cancel one of my buddy's baseball tix and had him flagged as a reseller because he transferred a lot of his tix. Guy has season tix in multiple sports, goes to a ton of games, and works hard to fill his seats when he can't make a game. Usually sells tix right around face value, almost never lists them on ticketmaster or other secondary sites, gives them away for free if he can't sell, and pretty much all of them end up in a Gator fan's hands. Seems like the kind of guy you'd want having tix, but somehow he was flagged..
This season so far seems like a poor job of scheduling. There have been so many baseball and softball games st the same time, usually starting only 30 min apart. I have tix to both and have to choose between them. Last season there was hardly a weekend series that conflicted. This year we have even had multiple Friday games with softball, baseball and gymnastics at the same time. Maybe a better turnout if they didn't pit one vs the other so often. As far as students, they don't come out unless there is a free t-shirt or something and then literally turn around and walk out.
Aren’t the schedules made after the SEC does its scheduling? I would think that SEC sets the SEC schedules, and the schools don’t have much choice. They just have to work around what the SEC gives them. Please correct me if I am wrong.
I have only one condition to sell my tickets at cost and that is you have to be a Gator or Gator fan.
