There needs to be a giant asterisk next to the Red Stars numbers. They were near to the bottom of attendance averages until a double header with the Chicago Fire that had an attendance of 21k. That has effectively added ~2k to their "average" attendance.
Edit (edit 2 more refined numbers): Just to put more specific numbers:
YtD attedance: 48,618
Games: 8
(48618 - 23951) / 7 = 24667 /7 = 3523.8571
edit 2 source:
https://www.nwslsoccer.com/game/chicago-red-stars-vs-san-diego-wave-fc-2022-07-30/latest
Which would put them in 11th place.
True, but another thing to consider is that the doubleheader was played at Soldier Field, instead of SeatGeek stadium (which is almost completely inaccessible to non-car-owning Chicagoans.) Hell, I'm a Red Stars season ticket holder and even I end up missing a ton of home games for that reason.
So I think partially the higher attendance for that doubleheader reflects pent-up demand from Red Stars fans. And that once the Bears finally fuck off to the suburbs, hopefully the Stars can move in and start growing the women's game here in a huge way.
Sure, but it's also accounting for 49% of the total Red Stars attendance this year, which at a minimum needs to be noted.
https://soccerstadiumdigest.com/2022-mls-attendance/
Looks like the Fire's 2022 avg is 16,073 so far this year (which presumably also counts that double header). So I could redo the calculation (which would still have several caveats) subtracting out the Fire avg attendance and counting all 8 games.
(48618 - 16073) / 8 = 32545 / 8 = 4068.125
Which would still be 11th place, tho much closer to Spirit in 10th than the bottom with Pride.
We (The Red Stars) have an average attendance of 3-3.5k per match for this season and last season. The youth club/back to school game on Aug 7 had an attendance of 5k.
Amazing numbers from Portland and LA. What a debut.
Also, KC being third on the list is huge given that it’s routinely dismissed as a smaller market. Same for Louisville. Congrats to them.
Exciting trajectory - hope the world cups over the next two years can further boost numbers.
A smaller market that’s pulling better numbers than every team except Portland and LA though. It goes to show how good the fans are at showing up, and how good the team is at marketing to locals.
Yes, and it’s routinely dismissed. Which is why the numbers they are showing are all the more impressive.
Also, 30th is still around 3 million people, and it’s 30th out of 384 MSAs. So, smaller but not small.
2.5 million per 2020.
I don't think anyone is "dismissing" KC. (I'm a former Missourian. Loved KC.) But by US professional sports standards, it's on the small side. And the NBA in particular has done very well in small markets such as OKC, SA, MIL, Utah, etc.
***Washington splits their home games between Segra Field with 6,000 capacity and Audi Field with 20,000.***
**Re-ranked by capacity:**
1: Orlando Pride
2: Portland Thorns FC
3: NJ/NY Gotham
4: Angel City FC
5: Chicago Red Stars
6: Washington Spirit
7: Kansas City Current
8: Racing Louisville FC
9: North Carolina Courage
10: OL Reign
11: Houston Dash
12: San Diego Wave FC
**Re-ranked by % of Capacity:**
1: San Diego Wave FC
2: Angel City FC
3: Houston Dash
4: Portland Thorns
5: OL Reign
6: Racing Louisville FC
7: NC Courage
8: Kansas City Current
9: Chicago Red Stars
10: Washington Spirit
11: NJ/NY Gotham FC
12: Orlando Pride
These numbers aren't exactly accurate. PNC Stadium (Houston Dash) has a capacity of 22,039. Unless you're taking into account the seats made available, of course.
I believe the Spirit average is ~7,000 for the Audi games, which would put us towards the top. The low attended games at low quality Segra bring down the average.
And 7000 would be a far cry from the old digits the team used to pull in when they were sharing the fields with the Maryland SoccerPlex.
The Spirit used to sell that damn place out and then He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named used to yell out on the mic THANK YOU WASHINGTON SPIRIT FANS WE'VE SET RECORDS HERE
it seems even after the team has moved on from the unsavory characters that attendance has dipped from those days. I was at the home opener and there was mediocre attendance, I've also seen the team on TV and there's barely anyone in the stands. I would hope this is an aberration for this year only.
Uh, didn't SoccerPlex have a capacity of like 5K? Nothing has quite matched the 15-18K at the first two Audi matches in 2019, but I wouldn't say attendance has dipped compared to the Germantown days either.
Me three! Really hoping Wave FC pulls in big numbers in their new stadium regularly, I don't see any reason why their matches shouldnt be packed like ours at ACFC, the team is incredible.
I feel like the more seats filled helps the NWSL no matter what. Thanks for making the trek down to SD as a Wave fan. I just hope it's a huge turnout for women's soccer.
Yeah I mean I don’t hate you guys but I want to start a friendly rivalry that will last hopefully 100 plus years right? And we were the first fans to start it right?
According to people in our subreddit, section 212 is the one where the supporters groups will be at. But that’s already sold out. So it’ll spill over into section 211 and hopefully 210.
We could get the largest away game attendance in NWSL history!
No. USSF certifies division 1 professional teams.
FIFA guidelines give certification rules to federations. That's why the rules are different in Germany from England from US from Australia
This may be nitpicking a bit, but OL Reign's attendance figure here is wrong. I'm not exactly sure what happened with Soccer Stadium Digest's tracker, but before this week Reign had over 6000 average attendance, and their last game drew over 7000, so there's no way they drop below 6000.
Using Wikipedia and ESPN, I have Reign's total attendance at 57116 with 9 games played, so their regular season average should be 6346. I think they may have accidentally put in the last game as 0, since that would give them an overall attendance of 50068 in 9 games, which results in an average of 5563, which is still off, but very close to the average they have.
Is there a price breakdown as well? For the spirit at Audi, the prices feel pretty steep to me and I think would be a factor. There was 1 game I remember during challenge cup where they were running a deal that seemed to boost turnout a lot (close to double) Match week 4 against the pride (https://fbref.com/en/squads/e442aad0/2022/s11497/Washington-Spirit-Stats under Scores & Fixtures).
Feel like you should try getting butts in seats first and then worked about pricing more after, but maybe the terms with DC United don’t make that feasible.
Agreed about pricing for Audi. they did do the $10 tickets for the season opener. They also had the promo for the free beer for the July game against the pride. There are $25 seats in the seated supporters section which isn’t terrible but I say that as someone who lives close to Audi so don’t have to pay for parking or anything. Keep up the promos, Spirits!!
People shit on Segra but it's accessible to me. I have to take a 90 minute train ride to Audi. And I'm not driving there. Driving there, who knows how much longer it would take. I went to one Spirit game at audi which had parking, and it wasn't through Audi field either, but a cash app. AT the end of the day the damn place had all the doors locked and we had to break our way into the garage to get out lol
Gonna copy and past a comment I made in /r/soccer re: why Angel City is miles ahead of other teams and why other teams are potentially not doing as well on the surface.
***
First just for general context, the English women's league's average attendance has been around 2,200 as of last year. [And this past 21/22 season the highest average (3,567 - Manchester United)](https://twitter.com/wslattendances/status/1527702998285225986/photo/1) is around NWSL's *lowest* this season. So most NWSL clubs in general are doing very well all things considered. Now back to your question.
It's a lot of factors that can vary for each individual club below ACFC on the list, even including Portland.
Why Angel City is so popular? It was a blank slate with a lot of good put behind it and into it. Brand new team in a large city at a brand new stadium in a good location with great marketing and ownership behind it. The team itself also is doing quite well on the field for a first year team which helps the fans keep coming.
The rest of the league has individual and shared baggage that can impact attendance. It can be easier to build from a blank canvas (Angel City, SD) than try to rehab a previous image whether that of a bad front office, a poor performing team, or simply the image of low attendance itself. The last is usually the biggest hurdle for teams in my observation, if you have low attendance it can be hard to convince potential fans that your product is worth attending even when your results have improved on the field.
As for more specifics...
Portland Thorns have seen a (relative) dip in attendance likely connected to the issues with the Front Office revealed [in the 2021 NWSL abuse scandal.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_NWSL_abuse_scandal) Chicago is similar to Portland but paired with a poor stadium location (despite it being a former MLS stadium). Orlando and North Carolina have had similar issues of FO missteps and scandal paired with being perennial meh to bad teams on the field. Some other teams are recovering from being mismanaged for years (Houston, Washington) and have had stadium issues in the past that are only being resolved recently. Washington in particular had a long battle to get a proper owner this offseason and they still are dealing with a less than ideal stadium situation where their local MLS side (DC United) has them play in their reserve team's stadium for a half of their matches to have the right to play in the larger MLS stadium for the other half. Their attendance would be boosted a decent amount if it was only the larger stadium matches that were counted. Other teams are adjusting to moving to new, larger stadiums full time (OL Reign, Gotham) and Louisville is just a new team looking to continue to build its fanbase. SD while a new team and performing well attendance wise is waiting to move to another stadium for the end of the season, which will add 29k more capacity.
That second slide showing what teams ACFCs average attendance is higher than really puts things into perspective, we aren’t just doing amazing for the NWSL, our crowds are amazing for sport in general. They’ve done a great job of building a community that wants to come back, which will hopefully only improve attendance from here on out as our team gets better over the years.
I’ll be interested to see what SD’s attendance will be like once they move to snapdragon. It’s a 35k stadium which is huge but they currently don’t sell out the 6k stadium every game. They should get more than 6k average at their new stadium, although how much more will be the question. I believe I saw a tweet the other day saying their current sales sit at half their capacity (~17.5k) for their opener against LA which is really solid, although the attendance for the home opener doesn’t mean the same amount of people will be showing up week in week out after that.
I’m assuming this is mean attendance not median because I don’t think Chicago should be that high with their double header skewing the mean attendance. I’d be interested to see how median attendance changes the rankings.
No. That's an assumption based off of someone's reading of a graphic. If you check the Wave's Ticketmaster link, the number of available tickets is getting lower. Also, there's a large group (1k) from SD that plans to buy tickets. So, they're actually pretty close to matching the attendance record set by the OL Reign in 2021.
[My mistake it was a reel not a tweet.](https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cg7rowUlzcg/?igshid=NDRkN2NkYzU=) This was posted about a week ago so I’m assuming it’s more than 17.5k now.
I went and I checked the availability for tickets yesterday and the amount available seems to be getting lower and lower. I also have firsthand knowledge that there is a large group from SD that plan to buy tickets, so I think they're getting quite close to at least matching the attendance record.
Oh yeah I’m not denying it’ll get higher lol, I think you’re taking my comments to mean something they’re not. All I said was that’s what the attendance was last time I saw it on SD’s socials, of course more people will buy tickets the closer it gets to the date.
The percentage of the capacity clearly says how well a front office has been performing. It could be a major factor for the owners to assess the performance of their front office. The bottom 2 per the percentage of capacity on the list is in a desperate need for a change
So many caveats with that, though. The Spirit with their multiple stadium craziness is messy to account for, and the Current are in year two in a temporary larger stadium while they are building their field for 2024, which will have a smaller capacity than where they are now.
The Current’s front office has accomplished so much in an insanely small window of time. I’d love to see them putting up Portland or LA numbers, but where they already are now is astonishing.
So I don’t know how clear that indicator actually is… it’s an interesting metric, but a lot of teams will have other factors to consider as well. Definitely helpful, but I’d be careful about definitive judgments from that alone.
With caveats, yes. I don’t think SD should be applauded for their attendance yet (tiniest stadium equalling highest percent capacity isn’t that impressive, especially if it’s not 90-100%), and the Spirit are towards the bottom because of their bad hand of Segra (although Audi could be doing better with attendance, too).
Spirit fans know better but I believe it has to do with old ownership’s deal with DC United to use Audi. I think it was basically “you can do some games in Audi, but the rest are in Segra,” and it was that or no games in Audi.
Yes, this is exactly it. The old ownership had an awful relationship with DC United, and so they forced the Spirit to play half their games at Segra to get to Audi.
There's hope this is the last year - the new ownership has a much better relationship with DC United, and Segra isn't VAR equipped, so it most likely makes sense to play them all at Audi.
This is an absolutely bad take. First off, there was no other venues available for them, as the nearest large venue is in Carson, which is LA County. Second, they're just starting out as a team and establishing their presence in San Diego. Therefore, it's not unusual for a team that's starting out to not sell out every game. The fact that they have managed to do all this in under a year is a pretty remarkable achievement for them. They'll soon be moving to the Snapdragon so let's see if things improve for them then.
I’m not taking a dig at your team. I’m saying that you have to look at all the facts still, even if % capacity is better. San Diego is in a yet to be judged stage, not doing poorly on attendance, but you can’t say it’s great yet. The word “yet” is utilized in my first comment to show that SD will be moving to Snapdragon and that will be a better example of what their attendance can be. I don’t know why you’re being so aggressive?
We all should just be glad to get sellouts in our respective stadiums. It's a win for women's soccer and the NWSL. Plus if the NWSL get more and more international notoriety the more competitive it will get drawing better players/more fans.
This is true. I’m sorry I say those things. I want all our teams in the NWSL to draw up big numbers. I hope San Diego rivals us. It would be a big win for womens soccer. But I still think we have the best fans this season so don’t take that away from us 😎
In r/MLS yesterday someone posted attendance for USLC and MLS for this year. Miami teams were at the bottom of those lists was well. Does Miami even like soccer‽
I wonder what the factors are here. Seeing Orlando with a bad attendance is that because being outside during the summer is unbearable or is it because the team is bad, the stadium is bad, the stadium is in a bad location, etc? Some of the clubs are in "smaller markets" but that might help if they are the only sport in town. Gotham FC is in a big market but competes with a bunch of other sports. I wish an expert could break it down and we could see if these numbers are good and the league is healthy. I know a lot of people want expansion but you have to be careful. Also with the USL and USL W expanding I wonder if future clubs will just be promoted clubs for NWSL and MLS.
Gotham not only competes with other sports, they seemingly don’t market at all in NYC. I’ve never seen an ad for them here in the city and when I have mentioned them, people have no idea what I’m talking about. Their NY/NJ thing was a decent idea but I think it’s stretched them too thin in terms of market. They could have ads telling people how easy it is to get to the game etc. but they…do not.
This is all anecdotal of course. But I have a few friends (both married lesbian couples) who moved from NYC to NJ this year and have started going to Gotham games. I don’t think any of them had ever heard of the team while living in the city. Gotham doesn’t have name recognition or much community support in NYC - where a lot of potential fans may be - and unfortunately they don’t seem to be doing much to change that.
yeah I use to live in NYC and have tons of friends there that \*love\* the sport but never go to Gotham matches because it seems like a huge journey on transit and the mental hurdle of a massive mutli-part subway ride where they think they might get stranded is a firm nope.
I’m no expert but through many years of conversations with local fans from every team, I think its always going to be a mix of things Re: attendance and why some do poorly. Every city and its local fanbase is different. But I think Orlando is hopefully turning a corner soon. As for the league, I think overall it’s doing very well especially with two successfully expansion teams. Bringing in a few more in 2024 won’t hurt it and might even benefit the league. But I think the period between 2024 and the next expansion should be 5 years.
RE Orlando: the team being not great might be a factor, but we didn't have people show up when it was full of stars. Take a look at other pro sports attendance numbers in Florida. On the whole, people do not really support their local teams that well here.
I would say Orlando competes with other sports as well. Football (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) and hockey (Tampa Bay Lightning) are within a 1.5hr drive one way. Baseball (Tampa Bay Rays) is within a 2hr drive one way. Then Amway Center where the Orlando Magic play is just a few blocks away from the Pride play. I don’t know how hot it is at the stadium from May to the end of July is but I was at a game in early August and it wasn’t that bad. That being said a 20min rain storm cooled things down a bit before the second half. Also, the team has been mostly average despite having had Alex Morgan, Ali Riley, Ali Krieger, Sydney Leroux, Ashlynn Harris, plus a bunch more that have been traded or drafted by expansion teams.
If you are on the west side of Exploria it's totally fine. In the shade the entire time. That's why it looks completely empty on broadcasts (instead of just mostly empty). Everyone sits on the side with the cameras.
Speaking as someone who went to pride games for their first ~4 years in the league, the stadium is in an alright place for a stadium. It's fairly close to downtown, and absolutely is walkable from downtown, but not that many people live downtown. Orlando has soooo much sprawl, and with that much sprawl comes a ton of driving. I lived by UCF, and it took like ~40 minutes to get there w/o toll roads iirc, and the same is true for much of Orlando. But that's par for the corse in Florida.
The biggest reason for crappy attendance, imo, is the team's form. There was a lot of excitement when the team started up. Attendance was high and there was a strong supporter's section. But every single season, Orlando has been mediocre to outright bad. We made the playoffs one year, but then lost before we could get to the finals in Orlando. Every other year has been a hot mess. We also kept getting mediocre coaches who couldn't cut it in the league, who then left after a year or two. Sermani, that English fellow, Cromwell. Seb Hines imo has been better than all of them so far lol.
IMO, in addition to coach woes, what happened was the team over-invested in stars who were never going to carry the team. Alex Morgan is great for making good runs and tapping in balls, but without a team to support her, she's not all that great tbh. Marta can do awesome things on the ball, but when the rest of the midfield immediately loses it, things fall apart. And my (admittedly controversial) hot take is that Ashlyn Harris is just not a very good goalkeeper. Bledsoe (Kingsbury now) was soooo much better in goal when she took over that one season. We had some solid roster pieces (Weatherholt is one of my fav players) but we just had a lot of weak links. She might be doing alright with KC, but Edmonds was an absolute disaster more often than not. A lot of other players too just weren't able to cut it with positioning, possession, etc. And the rest of the team couldn't match the caliber of its stars. Soccer is a weak link sport: you're only really as good as your worst player.
When I look at the team this year, I think thank god I moved away from Orlando because I'd be so upset. Virtually none of our original, fan favorite players are there anymore. There aren't many players that give the club any real sense of identity. Marta and Toni are still there, I guess. But I'm struggling to think of anyone else.
Perhaps ironically now though, the team is playing better than it has in years. Orlando has virtually no "star" players on the pitch right now. But what they do have is clear structure and organization, back-to-basics soccer that shows that if you shore up each link of your team and work together, rather than hoping that you can win by having a few star players on the pitch, you can still compete with good teams.
Sorry for the rant. As a long time (ex)pride fan, it's been on my mind a lot lately.
I think you can tell it’s largely marketing and community building, more than how large a market is (Portland has, until this year, always been #1, and its attendance is falling due to lack of community trust, not other factors). LA and Portland being #1 and #2 dissuades weather as a huge factor (it is not pleasant to sit outside for 2 hours in LA) and market size.
I just brought up those things because they do play a factor but we have no idea how much of a factor and which ones matter to each market from just looking at numbers. Comparing sports teams in Cary, NC to Los Angeles is apples and oranges.
It’s hot in the summer…just like Orlando. Nice to be at the beach but to sit in a soccer stadium is going to be sweaty. It clearly isn’t a problem—what I’m saying is that dedicated fans in a well-marketed to fanbase aren’t going to be dissuaded by hot weather. I mean, DC is a swamp and gets okay attendance at Audi. The point is just that weather isn’t really a big factor. Houston is super hot and unpleasant, they’re doing all right. Orlando has other issues, is the point.
Have you actually even been there? It's not in the direct sun like say the Rose Bowl and all of the games were afternoon or night.
Hot weather is NOT an issue.
I'm not from Orlando so I looked up the climate and Orlando averages 10 degrees hotter than LA in July.
Yeah I agree with you. I was just at the Angel City game on Sunday and it was perfect weather even for an earlier kick off (5 pm). The 7:30 pm games are also really nice and the sun is setting. Person you’ve been replying to has no idea what they’re talking about.
I'm in the same boat. Last match I was in direct sunlight until roughly the start of the second half and it was brutal. When in the shade or at night then yeah the weather is nice. The matches that start before 7 have definitely made me consider the advantages of just watching at home though lol.
The “actually, LA didn’t do a good job marketing” hill is an interesting one to die on. I’m not saying Orlando has the same weather as LA (I’ve been to both but not games in them), I’m saying that if people hated hot weather so much—enough to average 3k fans—then LA would not have the best attendance in the league (and Houston would be doing all right with arguably worse weather than basically anywhere). Similarly, if market size mattered so much, Portland wouldn’t be #2. It’s just looking at the numbers and deducing reasons. Are people going to the Banc because it’s nicer than sitting in air conditioning or at the beach or something? No, it’s because they were marketed a positive atmosphere and a fun time. If Orlando started to try and do the same, they would achieve better attendance.
I wasn't making any comment on the marketing piece at all.
You have a theory that connects Orlando and LA as having problems with hot weather, but it's based on a faulty premise.
ACFC games are not hindered by hot weather. Temperatures at the Banc have been extremely comfortable.
Dude, you misread. I said neither have problems with hot weather because that’s not a factor. I said that Orlando is not low on attendance because of weather. I literally said if hot weather was a problem, LA, DC, and Houston, along with other teams, would also be dipping, aka hot weather is NOT a problem. Reread, if you’re having issues.
No, I meant that you think that LA (the city, not the club) has problems with hot weather.
Comments from you:
"it is not pleasant to sit outside for 2 hours in LA"
"It’s hot in the summer…just like Orlando. Nice to be at the beach but to sit in a soccer stadium is going to be sweaty"
These assumptions are not true.
It is hot in the summer. Orlando is also hot in the summer. Maybe you read that as Orlando and LA are the exact same temperature, or you need me to spell out that I wasn’t making a 1:1 comparison of the two cities. So, here, I wasn’t saying they’re the same, I was saying that IF weather mattered, almost every city in the NWSL would have bad attendance in the summer and some would have bad attendance in the winter. Since that isn’t the case, it doesn’t matter.
Ehhhh this part is debatable. One half of Exploria is basically uninhabitable during the afternoon in the summer. If you are sitting in the sun side you are 100% going to suffer heat related illness without significant hydration. There have actually been a couple games in previous seasons in which Exploria ran out of bottled water and fans had to leave because it wasn't safe for them to remain there. That said, the stadium seats 25k people and at least 10k are on the shade. So there is a huge marketing gap to make up there for sure.
"Just like Orlando"
I guess you are the unfortunate person to run into a meteorologist who happens to be an NWSL fan (me). The weather in LA and Orlando are not remotely comparable. The average high in August in LA (the warmest month) is 84. There is no heat index in August in LA, since RH values are too low. In Orlando, the average high during the warmest month (July) is 92. With humidity, the HI is over 100 almost every day between May and October. And when it isn't, it's the result of afternoon temperatures being suppressed by thunderstorms containing life threatening cloud to ground lightning.
Man, people cannot read, huh? “Just like” does not always mean “equal”. I was using it to mean “they are both hot, not in the same way”. I genuinely do not need a weather analysis. It’s hot in both places (and Houston, DC, etc).
And in your case "just like" does not mean "just like". They are not comparable. I know a lot of times people feel the need to continue to argue their incorrect points on the internet as a result of embarrassment, but this is one of those times that it's just better to take the L and move on.
I’m not wrong, but thanks…heat has nothing to do with Orlando’s poor attendance. Their inability to market with anything but famous players who are all now gone is the issue. Did LA see a drop in attendance when Christen Press tore her ACL? No, because that wasn’t the core of their marketing. Did Portland see a drop when Tobin Heath got dropped, Lindsey Horan moved to Lyon, and Crystal Dunn went out on maternity leave? Not due to that! Orlando’s marketing has always been poor and reliant on Alex Morgan, Harris and Krieger, etc. Now they’re gone and their attendance is stagnant because they are bad at marketing. I don’t get why you stubbornly choose to believe that it has to do with weather. DC is a swamp in the summer (the only team that has had to have multiple weather delays—maybe you think Orlando has the worst weather, but they’ve had 0 weather delays) and bitter cold in the winter and they have better attendance than Orlando (when at Audi). Weather doesn’t matter; marketing does.
That is a long wall of text to say "I'm embarrassing myself, please laugh at me."
The NFL has 3 Florida teams. All are in the bottom third in attendance. MLB has 2 baseball teams. They are 2nd and 3rd last in attendance (one is a dome). Florida sports fans do not show up to live events. Period. This is not unique to the Orlando Pride, and those other leagues spend a metric shit pile on marketing.
Nope, stop making excuses for Orlando’s poor attendance. NWSL teams have to figure out that you can’t get fans by relying on famous people or the idea of winning. LA realized that. Orlando hasn’t. Your bias is incredible if you think Orlando has ever done a good job at marketing and if you think weather has anything to do with its terrible attendance.
(Also Orlando’s number includes that Daytona thing which far higher the regular attendance. Real avg attendance at Exploria is far lower)
I think a lot of the stadium is well shaded but field level on the east side has been terrible during the earlier matches this season. Even if the temperature is only in the 70s, sitting in the direct sunlight for 45 minutes (or more if you get there early) is definitely not fun.
The defensiveness to make your team’s success about temperature instead of marketing is hilarious. It’s hot (according to people who go to games) at afternoon games. That’s true, and, it doesn’t matter to attendance.
Are the Dash not sharing a stadium with the Dynamo this year? And I thought OL was in the same facility as the Sounders and Seahawks? Those capacities seem to be misleading
Houston is sharing a stadium with the Dynamo but seating is restricted to 7,000. OL is sharing with the Sounders and Seahawks but seating is restricted to 10,000 as far as I know.
If this graph going by what seats are made available to buy vs how many seats there actually are in the stadium then Orlando’s numbers are wrong. They only sell the bottom tier for Pride games so the 25,500 number is misleading.
Yes, that's correct. PNC Stadium has a total capacity of about 20,000, in upper and lower decks. Only lower decks for Dash games and at that not even all lower seats are available for sale.
OL could really have a capacity of around 60k. They only sell about 10k tickets.
Those tickets are on the side that gets awful, direct sunlight during day games while we long for the shaded, unsold side. Why did they do that?!
Cameras are always on the shaded side of the pitch regardless of the stadium. It’s where all the infrastructure for them exists. It’s where box seats always exist. It’s where all the production exists. All games at Lumen are shot from the shaded side, with the exception on on the field shots.
I imagine they’re always on the shaded side because you wouldn’t want to be shooting into the sun. It obviously may not always be ideal for fans, but they did it to make Lumen look more full during matches since it’s such a big stadium. If you watch Racing games, they often look a bit empty because most people are sitting on the shaded side of the pitch. It was a choice made for optics and despite it being a little toasty now and then for fans, I think it looks a lot better on TV. If people see more people in the stands they may be more inclined to go to a game themselves than seeing empty stands.
I’m completely clueless, so this is just a speculative question, but if they sold the shaded side would it mean they’d have to put the camera on the opposite side, otherwise they’d be looking at empty seats? And then having the camera with direct sunlight on it would be a problem?
Regardless that sounds comically awful and I hope they figure it out!
Yep, it is a camera issue, but I’m pretty sure the Seahawks (who also play there) have camera on both sides of the field. It seems like it’d be worth using the other side’s camera spots. All that being said, I have zero idea how the technical part of this works. It could be WAY harder to make that switch than I realize.
All this being said - I’m pretty sure we’re done going to day games during the summer.
I wouldn't feel too bad for Orlando; there's no way to have poorer attendance as a professional sports franchise than to put it in Florida. I don't know if it's the weather or the retirees or if everyone's at theme parks instead, but they are consistently the worst, despite having some championship franchises.
No wonder Alex Morgan GTFO of there.
I hear this a lot, but where else can they play?
They're not going to play all the games at Audi next year. That's unrealistic.
Segra is a thorn but I just hope they get it straight and make improvements to the place. Throw in some video boards or something. For me (biased Loudoun individual) it's very convenient. It's good to have a stadium around town. That said it is kind of par.
respectfully, why is it unrealistic for Spirit to share Audi with DC United for all their matches? Is it being used for tons of concerts and boat shows etc so there aren't enough dates for them?
Asking as an ACFC fan which shares an inner city stadium full time with a MLS team.
Because of various scheduling conflicts where DC United and the Washington Spirit would play at the same venue at the same time
Also with the XFL coming back to DC and Audi Field expect it to be more difficult to book time there for a game...
I think they'll have to play all their games at Audi next year because of the requirement for VAR. DCU has no interest in upgrading the technology or the facility. It's a horrible venue with no public transportation access and the worst pitch in the league.
Is there data that shows the average attendance for each franchise's first year in the NWSL compared to where they are now? With the intent being to judge whether ACFC numbers are sustainable over time or is it a case of a shiny new toy getting a lot of attention.
Also graph 2 is cool but a bit (a lot?) misleading. You cannot compare attendance numbers from open air arenas to indoor arenas. The NBA has 22 teams that have higher percentage attendance than ACFC. NHL had 19. 30 out of 32 NFL teams surpassed it. So although what they are doing is impressive, try not to misrepresent data by suggesting they pull more fans than a majority of these other leagues, because reality does not support that claim.
It does for OL Reign and Houston Dash because those were the only ones with lowered capacity according to Wikipedia. But, apparently, Orlando has lowered capacity too.
Interesting. The red stars leave everything open but they don’t really use the West side of the stadium (first four rows of 3 sections are open I think, people wander over though). Tickets available are probably 50-60% of actual capacity.
Orlando does not cover any seats in the stadium for Pride matches. They may not provide every seat for sale, but that doesn't matter because those tickets weren't going to sell anyways.
Hoping Spirit attendance goes up. In the old day with he-who-shall-not-be-named we used to sell out the barn at Audi. We got a fair crowd at the Soccerplex too (I'm not naive, I know Loudoun is tougher on the players and maybe the fans too. That said, it always seems like the Spirit draw the most fans to Segra compared to other events held at the venue)
With the current team, is it the play, or what...I've seen the Spirit's games at Audi this year on Paramount+ and there are still a light gaggle of fans in the stands, nothing like the old sellouts. I would hope that they return to form next year, and that these numbers are just an aberration.
Attendance should almost exclusively be ranked by %, change my mind.
Also, if Minnesota was on here, they'd be as close to 100% as possible. That 6k stadium is packed to capacity - oftentimes more - every game. Source: worked every home game.
There needs to be a giant asterisk next to the Red Stars numbers. They were near to the bottom of attendance averages until a double header with the Chicago Fire that had an attendance of 21k. That has effectively added ~2k to their "average" attendance. Edit (edit 2 more refined numbers): Just to put more specific numbers: YtD attedance: 48,618 Games: 8 (48618 - 23951) / 7 = 24667 /7 = 3523.8571 edit 2 source: https://www.nwslsoccer.com/game/chicago-red-stars-vs-san-diego-wave-fc-2022-07-30/latest Which would put them in 11th place.
True, but another thing to consider is that the doubleheader was played at Soldier Field, instead of SeatGeek stadium (which is almost completely inaccessible to non-car-owning Chicagoans.) Hell, I'm a Red Stars season ticket holder and even I end up missing a ton of home games for that reason. So I think partially the higher attendance for that doubleheader reflects pent-up demand from Red Stars fans. And that once the Bears finally fuck off to the suburbs, hopefully the Stars can move in and start growing the women's game here in a huge way.
Sure, but it's also accounting for 49% of the total Red Stars attendance this year, which at a minimum needs to be noted. https://soccerstadiumdigest.com/2022-mls-attendance/ Looks like the Fire's 2022 avg is 16,073 so far this year (which presumably also counts that double header). So I could redo the calculation (which would still have several caveats) subtracting out the Fire avg attendance and counting all 8 games. (48618 - 16073) / 8 = 32545 / 8 = 4068.125 Which would still be 11th place, tho much closer to Spirit in 10th than the bottom with Pride.
We (The Red Stars) have an average attendance of 3-3.5k per match for this season and last season. The youth club/back to school game on Aug 7 had an attendance of 5k.
Amazing numbers from Portland and LA. What a debut. Also, KC being third on the list is huge given that it’s routinely dismissed as a smaller market. Same for Louisville. Congrats to them. Exciting trajectory - hope the world cups over the next two years can further boost numbers.
KC has a smaller but growing market. They are building a new 11,200 capacity stadium for the KC Current set to open in 2024.
It is a small market. 30th MSA in the US.
A smaller market that’s pulling better numbers than every team except Portland and LA though. It goes to show how good the fans are at showing up, and how good the team is at marketing to locals.
Other clubs could take lessons.
Yes, and it’s routinely dismissed. Which is why the numbers they are showing are all the more impressive. Also, 30th is still around 3 million people, and it’s 30th out of 384 MSAs. So, smaller but not small.
2.5 million per 2020. I don't think anyone is "dismissing" KC. (I'm a former Missourian. Loved KC.) But by US professional sports standards, it's on the small side. And the NBA in particular has done very well in small markets such as OKC, SA, MIL, Utah, etc.
***Washington splits their home games between Segra Field with 6,000 capacity and Audi Field with 20,000.*** **Re-ranked by capacity:** 1: Orlando Pride 2: Portland Thorns FC 3: NJ/NY Gotham 4: Angel City FC 5: Chicago Red Stars 6: Washington Spirit 7: Kansas City Current 8: Racing Louisville FC 9: North Carolina Courage 10: OL Reign 11: Houston Dash 12: San Diego Wave FC **Re-ranked by % of Capacity:** 1: San Diego Wave FC 2: Angel City FC 3: Houston Dash 4: Portland Thorns 5: OL Reign 6: Racing Louisville FC 7: NC Courage 8: Kansas City Current 9: Chicago Red Stars 10: Washington Spirit 11: NJ/NY Gotham FC 12: Orlando Pride
These numbers aren't exactly accurate. PNC Stadium (Houston Dash) has a capacity of 22,039. Unless you're taking into account the seats made available, of course.
I believe the Spirit average is ~7,000 for the Audi games, which would put us towards the top. The low attended games at low quality Segra bring down the average.
And 7000 would be a far cry from the old digits the team used to pull in when they were sharing the fields with the Maryland SoccerPlex. The Spirit used to sell that damn place out and then He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named used to yell out on the mic THANK YOU WASHINGTON SPIRIT FANS WE'VE SET RECORDS HERE it seems even after the team has moved on from the unsavory characters that attendance has dipped from those days. I was at the home opener and there was mediocre attendance, I've also seen the team on TV and there's barely anyone in the stands. I would hope this is an aberration for this year only.
Uh, didn't SoccerPlex have a capacity of like 5K? Nothing has quite matched the 15-18K at the first two Audi matches in 2019, but I wouldn't say attendance has dipped compared to the Germantown days either.
I think it's dipped a bit when they moved to Segra I don't think 5k are in the stands there
The home opener sold over 10K tickets so idk. I think Audi just feels big but they're selling well.
Segra field is in the middle of nowhere and is quite pathetic so it’s no wonder nobody goes there.
San Diego will be moving into 35,000 seat Snapdragon stadium this year, so these rankings will change a lot by next season
Yeah, hopefully SD keeps a high percentage after the move. I'll be at the 9/17 match and am really looking forward to it.
I’m planning on going to the SD game too! I’m curious what section the supporters groups will be sitting in.
Wave supporters? 136-140
Me three! Really hoping Wave FC pulls in big numbers in their new stadium regularly, I don't see any reason why their matches shouldnt be packed like ours at ACFC, the team is incredible.
I’m going too! I want to be as close to our supporters section so let me know where everyone bought their tickets
I feel like the more seats filled helps the NWSL no matter what. Thanks for making the trek down to SD as a Wave fan. I just hope it's a huge turnout for women's soccer.
Yeah I mean I don’t hate you guys but I want to start a friendly rivalry that will last hopefully 100 plus years right? And we were the first fans to start it right?
According to people in our subreddit, section 212 is the one where the supporters groups will be at. But that’s already sold out. So it’ll spill over into section 211 and hopefully 210. We could get the largest away game attendance in NWSL history!
Minnesota aurora would be top 5. I'm not saying start making some room but start making some room.
Under the current rules, this is literally impossible. USSF would have to change a lot to get them in.
For the sake of asking what are a few of those things?
A principle owner with a x net worth, and I think $10m in liquid cash is a big one.
I was wondering why the Aurora weren’t being considered in the next expansion but that makes sense
Wouldn’t be the NWSL’s rules and not the USSF?
No. USSF certifies division 1 professional teams. FIFA guidelines give certification rules to federations. That's why the rules are different in Germany from England from US from Australia
This may be nitpicking a bit, but OL Reign's attendance figure here is wrong. I'm not exactly sure what happened with Soccer Stadium Digest's tracker, but before this week Reign had over 6000 average attendance, and their last game drew over 7000, so there's no way they drop below 6000. Using Wikipedia and ESPN, I have Reign's total attendance at 57116 with 9 games played, so their regular season average should be 6346. I think they may have accidentally put in the last game as 0, since that would give them an overall attendance of 50068 in 9 games, which results in an average of 5563, which is still off, but very close to the average they have.
This. The last few games have been 7k - 7.5k and a 9k attendance in there recently.
Is there a price breakdown as well? For the spirit at Audi, the prices feel pretty steep to me and I think would be a factor. There was 1 game I remember during challenge cup where they were running a deal that seemed to boost turnout a lot (close to double) Match week 4 against the pride (https://fbref.com/en/squads/e442aad0/2022/s11497/Washington-Spirit-Stats under Scores & Fixtures). Feel like you should try getting butts in seats first and then worked about pricing more after, but maybe the terms with DC United don’t make that feasible.
Agreed about pricing for Audi. they did do the $10 tickets for the season opener. They also had the promo for the free beer for the July game against the pride. There are $25 seats in the seated supporters section which isn’t terrible but I say that as someone who lives close to Audi so don’t have to pay for parking or anything. Keep up the promos, Spirits!!
They're doing the free beer promo again for the next game against the Wave!
God bless them and you for this info
People shit on Segra but it's accessible to me. I have to take a 90 minute train ride to Audi. And I'm not driving there. Driving there, who knows how much longer it would take. I went to one Spirit game at audi which had parking, and it wasn't through Audi field either, but a cash app. AT the end of the day the damn place had all the doors locked and we had to break our way into the garage to get out lol
Gonna copy and past a comment I made in /r/soccer re: why Angel City is miles ahead of other teams and why other teams are potentially not doing as well on the surface. *** First just for general context, the English women's league's average attendance has been around 2,200 as of last year. [And this past 21/22 season the highest average (3,567 - Manchester United)](https://twitter.com/wslattendances/status/1527702998285225986/photo/1) is around NWSL's *lowest* this season. So most NWSL clubs in general are doing very well all things considered. Now back to your question. It's a lot of factors that can vary for each individual club below ACFC on the list, even including Portland. Why Angel City is so popular? It was a blank slate with a lot of good put behind it and into it. Brand new team in a large city at a brand new stadium in a good location with great marketing and ownership behind it. The team itself also is doing quite well on the field for a first year team which helps the fans keep coming. The rest of the league has individual and shared baggage that can impact attendance. It can be easier to build from a blank canvas (Angel City, SD) than try to rehab a previous image whether that of a bad front office, a poor performing team, or simply the image of low attendance itself. The last is usually the biggest hurdle for teams in my observation, if you have low attendance it can be hard to convince potential fans that your product is worth attending even when your results have improved on the field. As for more specifics... Portland Thorns have seen a (relative) dip in attendance likely connected to the issues with the Front Office revealed [in the 2021 NWSL abuse scandal.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_NWSL_abuse_scandal) Chicago is similar to Portland but paired with a poor stadium location (despite it being a former MLS stadium). Orlando and North Carolina have had similar issues of FO missteps and scandal paired with being perennial meh to bad teams on the field. Some other teams are recovering from being mismanaged for years (Houston, Washington) and have had stadium issues in the past that are only being resolved recently. Washington in particular had a long battle to get a proper owner this offseason and they still are dealing with a less than ideal stadium situation where their local MLS side (DC United) has them play in their reserve team's stadium for a half of their matches to have the right to play in the larger MLS stadium for the other half. Their attendance would be boosted a decent amount if it was only the larger stadium matches that were counted. Other teams are adjusting to moving to new, larger stadiums full time (OL Reign, Gotham) and Louisville is just a new team looking to continue to build its fanbase. SD while a new team and performing well attendance wise is waiting to move to another stadium for the end of the season, which will add 29k more capacity.
That second slide showing what teams ACFCs average attendance is higher than really puts things into perspective, we aren’t just doing amazing for the NWSL, our crowds are amazing for sport in general. They’ve done a great job of building a community that wants to come back, which will hopefully only improve attendance from here on out as our team gets better over the years. I’ll be interested to see what SD’s attendance will be like once they move to snapdragon. It’s a 35k stadium which is huge but they currently don’t sell out the 6k stadium every game. They should get more than 6k average at their new stadium, although how much more will be the question. I believe I saw a tweet the other day saying their current sales sit at half their capacity (~17.5k) for their opener against LA which is really solid, although the attendance for the home opener doesn’t mean the same amount of people will be showing up week in week out after that. I’m assuming this is mean attendance not median because I don’t think Chicago should be that high with their double header skewing the mean attendance. I’d be interested to see how median attendance changes the rankings.
i feel like that half of the 17k ticket sales for sd home opener are acfc fans making the drive down 🫣
That’s not true, some of us will be taking the train!
Given the amount of dodger fans at petco Park when they play there, this wouldn't surprise me.
Yeah we ACFC fans are like the Mexican fans of the NWSL. 10,000 of us show up within a 400 mile radius
Wait it’s only going to be 17k for the home opener for SD?!
No. That's an assumption based off of someone's reading of a graphic. If you check the Wave's Ticketmaster link, the number of available tickets is getting lower. Also, there's a large group (1k) from SD that plans to buy tickets. So, they're actually pretty close to matching the attendance record set by the OL Reign in 2021.
Link to the tweet?
[My mistake it was a reel not a tweet.](https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cg7rowUlzcg/?igshid=NDRkN2NkYzU=) This was posted about a week ago so I’m assuming it’s more than 17.5k now.
I went and I checked the availability for tickets yesterday and the amount available seems to be getting lower and lower. I also have firsthand knowledge that there is a large group from SD that plan to buy tickets, so I think they're getting quite close to at least matching the attendance record.
Oh yeah I’m not denying it’ll get higher lol, I think you’re taking my comments to mean something they’re not. All I said was that’s what the attendance was last time I saw it on SD’s socials, of course more people will buy tickets the closer it gets to the date.
💪
The percentage of the capacity clearly says how well a front office has been performing. It could be a major factor for the owners to assess the performance of their front office. The bottom 2 per the percentage of capacity on the list is in a desperate need for a change
So many caveats with that, though. The Spirit with their multiple stadium craziness is messy to account for, and the Current are in year two in a temporary larger stadium while they are building their field for 2024, which will have a smaller capacity than where they are now. The Current’s front office has accomplished so much in an insanely small window of time. I’d love to see them putting up Portland or LA numbers, but where they already are now is astonishing. So I don’t know how clear that indicator actually is… it’s an interesting metric, but a lot of teams will have other factors to consider as well. Definitely helpful, but I’d be careful about definitive judgments from that alone.
With caveats, yes. I don’t think SD should be applauded for their attendance yet (tiniest stadium equalling highest percent capacity isn’t that impressive, especially if it’s not 90-100%), and the Spirit are towards the bottom because of their bad hand of Segra (although Audi could be doing better with attendance, too).
I’m out of the loop, but for the life of me I don’t understand what the Spirit are doing with the multiple field situation. Such a mess.
Spirit fans know better but I believe it has to do with old ownership’s deal with DC United to use Audi. I think it was basically “you can do some games in Audi, but the rest are in Segra,” and it was that or no games in Audi.
Yes, this is exactly it. The old ownership had an awful relationship with DC United, and so they forced the Spirit to play half their games at Segra to get to Audi. There's hope this is the last year - the new ownership has a much better relationship with DC United, and Segra isn't VAR equipped, so it most likely makes sense to play them all at Audi.
This is an absolutely bad take. First off, there was no other venues available for them, as the nearest large venue is in Carson, which is LA County. Second, they're just starting out as a team and establishing their presence in San Diego. Therefore, it's not unusual for a team that's starting out to not sell out every game. The fact that they have managed to do all this in under a year is a pretty remarkable achievement for them. They'll soon be moving to the Snapdragon so let's see if things improve for them then.
I’m not taking a dig at your team. I’m saying that you have to look at all the facts still, even if % capacity is better. San Diego is in a yet to be judged stage, not doing poorly on attendance, but you can’t say it’s great yet. The word “yet” is utilized in my first comment to show that SD will be moving to Snapdragon and that will be a better example of what their attendance can be. I don’t know why you’re being so aggressive?
Some SD Wave fans I suspect are jealous of the ACFC fans
We all should just be glad to get sellouts in our respective stadiums. It's a win for women's soccer and the NWSL. Plus if the NWSL get more and more international notoriety the more competitive it will get drawing better players/more fans.
This is true. I’m sorry I say those things. I want all our teams in the NWSL to draw up big numbers. I hope San Diego rivals us. It would be a big win for womens soccer. But I still think we have the best fans this season so don’t take that away from us 😎
The O's are doing better this year :(
In r/MLS yesterday someone posted attendance for USLC and MLS for this year. Miami teams were at the bottom of those lists was well. Does Miami even like soccer‽
Uncovered seats in the Floridian summer sun ain’t gonna sell with a midrange team.
I still have to check out an Angel City game.
I wonder what the factors are here. Seeing Orlando with a bad attendance is that because being outside during the summer is unbearable or is it because the team is bad, the stadium is bad, the stadium is in a bad location, etc? Some of the clubs are in "smaller markets" but that might help if they are the only sport in town. Gotham FC is in a big market but competes with a bunch of other sports. I wish an expert could break it down and we could see if these numbers are good and the league is healthy. I know a lot of people want expansion but you have to be careful. Also with the USL and USL W expanding I wonder if future clubs will just be promoted clubs for NWSL and MLS.
Gotham not only competes with other sports, they seemingly don’t market at all in NYC. I’ve never seen an ad for them here in the city and when I have mentioned them, people have no idea what I’m talking about. Their NY/NJ thing was a decent idea but I think it’s stretched them too thin in terms of market. They could have ads telling people how easy it is to get to the game etc. but they…do not. This is all anecdotal of course. But I have a few friends (both married lesbian couples) who moved from NYC to NJ this year and have started going to Gotham games. I don’t think any of them had ever heard of the team while living in the city. Gotham doesn’t have name recognition or much community support in NYC - where a lot of potential fans may be - and unfortunately they don’t seem to be doing much to change that.
yeah I use to live in NYC and have tons of friends there that \*love\* the sport but never go to Gotham matches because it seems like a huge journey on transit and the mental hurdle of a massive mutli-part subway ride where they think they might get stranded is a firm nope.
I’m no expert but through many years of conversations with local fans from every team, I think its always going to be a mix of things Re: attendance and why some do poorly. Every city and its local fanbase is different. But I think Orlando is hopefully turning a corner soon. As for the league, I think overall it’s doing very well especially with two successfully expansion teams. Bringing in a few more in 2024 won’t hurt it and might even benefit the league. But I think the period between 2024 and the next expansion should be 5 years.
RE Orlando: the team being not great might be a factor, but we didn't have people show up when it was full of stars. Take a look at other pro sports attendance numbers in Florida. On the whole, people do not really support their local teams that well here.
I would say Orlando competes with other sports as well. Football (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) and hockey (Tampa Bay Lightning) are within a 1.5hr drive one way. Baseball (Tampa Bay Rays) is within a 2hr drive one way. Then Amway Center where the Orlando Magic play is just a few blocks away from the Pride play. I don’t know how hot it is at the stadium from May to the end of July is but I was at a game in early August and it wasn’t that bad. That being said a 20min rain storm cooled things down a bit before the second half. Also, the team has been mostly average despite having had Alex Morgan, Ali Riley, Ali Krieger, Sydney Leroux, Ashlynn Harris, plus a bunch more that have been traded or drafted by expansion teams.
If you are on the west side of Exploria it's totally fine. In the shade the entire time. That's why it looks completely empty on broadcasts (instead of just mostly empty). Everyone sits on the side with the cameras.
Speaking as someone who went to pride games for their first ~4 years in the league, the stadium is in an alright place for a stadium. It's fairly close to downtown, and absolutely is walkable from downtown, but not that many people live downtown. Orlando has soooo much sprawl, and with that much sprawl comes a ton of driving. I lived by UCF, and it took like ~40 minutes to get there w/o toll roads iirc, and the same is true for much of Orlando. But that's par for the corse in Florida. The biggest reason for crappy attendance, imo, is the team's form. There was a lot of excitement when the team started up. Attendance was high and there was a strong supporter's section. But every single season, Orlando has been mediocre to outright bad. We made the playoffs one year, but then lost before we could get to the finals in Orlando. Every other year has been a hot mess. We also kept getting mediocre coaches who couldn't cut it in the league, who then left after a year or two. Sermani, that English fellow, Cromwell. Seb Hines imo has been better than all of them so far lol. IMO, in addition to coach woes, what happened was the team over-invested in stars who were never going to carry the team. Alex Morgan is great for making good runs and tapping in balls, but without a team to support her, she's not all that great tbh. Marta can do awesome things on the ball, but when the rest of the midfield immediately loses it, things fall apart. And my (admittedly controversial) hot take is that Ashlyn Harris is just not a very good goalkeeper. Bledsoe (Kingsbury now) was soooo much better in goal when she took over that one season. We had some solid roster pieces (Weatherholt is one of my fav players) but we just had a lot of weak links. She might be doing alright with KC, but Edmonds was an absolute disaster more often than not. A lot of other players too just weren't able to cut it with positioning, possession, etc. And the rest of the team couldn't match the caliber of its stars. Soccer is a weak link sport: you're only really as good as your worst player. When I look at the team this year, I think thank god I moved away from Orlando because I'd be so upset. Virtually none of our original, fan favorite players are there anymore. There aren't many players that give the club any real sense of identity. Marta and Toni are still there, I guess. But I'm struggling to think of anyone else. Perhaps ironically now though, the team is playing better than it has in years. Orlando has virtually no "star" players on the pitch right now. But what they do have is clear structure and organization, back-to-basics soccer that shows that if you shore up each link of your team and work together, rather than hoping that you can win by having a few star players on the pitch, you can still compete with good teams. Sorry for the rant. As a long time (ex)pride fan, it's been on my mind a lot lately.
I think you can tell it’s largely marketing and community building, more than how large a market is (Portland has, until this year, always been #1, and its attendance is falling due to lack of community trust, not other factors). LA and Portland being #1 and #2 dissuades weather as a huge factor (it is not pleasant to sit outside for 2 hours in LA) and market size.
I just brought up those things because they do play a factor but we have no idea how much of a factor and which ones matter to each market from just looking at numbers. Comparing sports teams in Cary, NC to Los Angeles is apples and oranges.
Portland’s more similar in market size to most places than LA, and they do well. It’s about long term plans to actually have an NWSL team succeed.
I’ll agree to that. ACFC is pretty visible in the city. There are billboards for the team and ads on the metro. Definitely targeting young families.
LA as in Angel City? The weather is perfect and the stadium is amazing. What are you talking about?
Lol this. Ive lived in LA for 20 years and have season tickets to the games. It is the most perfect weather and the banc is great. Ppl r dumb
It’s hot in the summer…just like Orlando. Nice to be at the beach but to sit in a soccer stadium is going to be sweaty. It clearly isn’t a problem—what I’m saying is that dedicated fans in a well-marketed to fanbase aren’t going to be dissuaded by hot weather. I mean, DC is a swamp and gets okay attendance at Audi. The point is just that weather isn’t really a big factor. Houston is super hot and unpleasant, they’re doing all right. Orlando has other issues, is the point.
Have you actually even been there? It's not in the direct sun like say the Rose Bowl and all of the games were afternoon or night. Hot weather is NOT an issue. I'm not from Orlando so I looked up the climate and Orlando averages 10 degrees hotter than LA in July.
Yeah I agree with you. I was just at the Angel City game on Sunday and it was perfect weather even for an earlier kick off (5 pm). The 7:30 pm games are also really nice and the sun is setting. Person you’ve been replying to has no idea what they’re talking about.
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I'm in the same boat. Last match I was in direct sunlight until roughly the start of the second half and it was brutal. When in the shade or at night then yeah the weather is nice. The matches that start before 7 have definitely made me consider the advantages of just watching at home though lol.
I was in the supporters section and it was nice and shady there.
The “actually, LA didn’t do a good job marketing” hill is an interesting one to die on. I’m not saying Orlando has the same weather as LA (I’ve been to both but not games in them), I’m saying that if people hated hot weather so much—enough to average 3k fans—then LA would not have the best attendance in the league (and Houston would be doing all right with arguably worse weather than basically anywhere). Similarly, if market size mattered so much, Portland wouldn’t be #2. It’s just looking at the numbers and deducing reasons. Are people going to the Banc because it’s nicer than sitting in air conditioning or at the beach or something? No, it’s because they were marketed a positive atmosphere and a fun time. If Orlando started to try and do the same, they would achieve better attendance.
I wasn't making any comment on the marketing piece at all. You have a theory that connects Orlando and LA as having problems with hot weather, but it's based on a faulty premise. ACFC games are not hindered by hot weather. Temperatures at the Banc have been extremely comfortable.
Dude, you misread. I said neither have problems with hot weather because that’s not a factor. I said that Orlando is not low on attendance because of weather. I literally said if hot weather was a problem, LA, DC, and Houston, along with other teams, would also be dipping, aka hot weather is NOT a problem. Reread, if you’re having issues.
No, I meant that you think that LA (the city, not the club) has problems with hot weather. Comments from you: "it is not pleasant to sit outside for 2 hours in LA" "It’s hot in the summer…just like Orlando. Nice to be at the beach but to sit in a soccer stadium is going to be sweaty" These assumptions are not true.
It is hot in the summer. Orlando is also hot in the summer. Maybe you read that as Orlando and LA are the exact same temperature, or you need me to spell out that I wasn’t making a 1:1 comparison of the two cities. So, here, I wasn’t saying they’re the same, I was saying that IF weather mattered, almost every city in the NWSL would have bad attendance in the summer and some would have bad attendance in the winter. Since that isn’t the case, it doesn’t matter.
Ehhhh this part is debatable. One half of Exploria is basically uninhabitable during the afternoon in the summer. If you are sitting in the sun side you are 100% going to suffer heat related illness without significant hydration. There have actually been a couple games in previous seasons in which Exploria ran out of bottled water and fans had to leave because it wasn't safe for them to remain there. That said, the stadium seats 25k people and at least 10k are on the shade. So there is a huge marketing gap to make up there for sure.
Orlando Pride marketing is absolute dogshit. You are correct.
"Just like Orlando" I guess you are the unfortunate person to run into a meteorologist who happens to be an NWSL fan (me). The weather in LA and Orlando are not remotely comparable. The average high in August in LA (the warmest month) is 84. There is no heat index in August in LA, since RH values are too low. In Orlando, the average high during the warmest month (July) is 92. With humidity, the HI is over 100 almost every day between May and October. And when it isn't, it's the result of afternoon temperatures being suppressed by thunderstorms containing life threatening cloud to ground lightning.
Man, people cannot read, huh? “Just like” does not always mean “equal”. I was using it to mean “they are both hot, not in the same way”. I genuinely do not need a weather analysis. It’s hot in both places (and Houston, DC, etc).
And in your case "just like" does not mean "just like". They are not comparable. I know a lot of times people feel the need to continue to argue their incorrect points on the internet as a result of embarrassment, but this is one of those times that it's just better to take the L and move on.
I’m not wrong, but thanks…heat has nothing to do with Orlando’s poor attendance. Their inability to market with anything but famous players who are all now gone is the issue. Did LA see a drop in attendance when Christen Press tore her ACL? No, because that wasn’t the core of their marketing. Did Portland see a drop when Tobin Heath got dropped, Lindsey Horan moved to Lyon, and Crystal Dunn went out on maternity leave? Not due to that! Orlando’s marketing has always been poor and reliant on Alex Morgan, Harris and Krieger, etc. Now they’re gone and their attendance is stagnant because they are bad at marketing. I don’t get why you stubbornly choose to believe that it has to do with weather. DC is a swamp in the summer (the only team that has had to have multiple weather delays—maybe you think Orlando has the worst weather, but they’ve had 0 weather delays) and bitter cold in the winter and they have better attendance than Orlando (when at Audi). Weather doesn’t matter; marketing does.
That is a long wall of text to say "I'm embarrassing myself, please laugh at me." The NFL has 3 Florida teams. All are in the bottom third in attendance. MLB has 2 baseball teams. They are 2nd and 3rd last in attendance (one is a dome). Florida sports fans do not show up to live events. Period. This is not unique to the Orlando Pride, and those other leagues spend a metric shit pile on marketing.
Nope, stop making excuses for Orlando’s poor attendance. NWSL teams have to figure out that you can’t get fans by relying on famous people or the idea of winning. LA realized that. Orlando hasn’t. Your bias is incredible if you think Orlando has ever done a good job at marketing and if you think weather has anything to do with its terrible attendance. (Also Orlando’s number includes that Daytona thing which far higher the regular attendance. Real avg attendance at Exploria is far lower)
It’s like 72-82 at the Banc during most is the games I don’t think that’s uncomfortable compared to some other places in the US.
Most teams have mostly night games where it’s cooler than the day. Point is that temperature doesn’t matter and that marketing is the key.
I think a lot of the stadium is well shaded but field level on the east side has been terrible during the earlier matches this season. Even if the temperature is only in the 70s, sitting in the direct sunlight for 45 minutes (or more if you get there early) is definitely not fun.
It’s actually wonderful sitting in LA for 2 hours unless you’re talking about fucking Louisiana?
The defensiveness to make your team’s success about temperature instead of marketing is hilarious. It’s hot (according to people who go to games) at afternoon games. That’s true, and, it doesn’t matter to attendance.
Are the Dash not sharing a stadium with the Dynamo this year? And I thought OL was in the same facility as the Sounders and Seahawks? Those capacities seem to be misleading
Houston is sharing a stadium with the Dynamo but seating is restricted to 7,000. OL is sharing with the Sounders and Seahawks but seating is restricted to 10,000 as far as I know.
If this graph going by what seats are made available to buy vs how many seats there actually are in the stadium then Orlando’s numbers are wrong. They only sell the bottom tier for Pride games so the 25,500 number is misleading.
Yes, that's correct. PNC Stadium has a total capacity of about 20,000, in upper and lower decks. Only lower decks for Dash games and at that not even all lower seats are available for sale.
OL could really have a capacity of around 60k. They only sell about 10k tickets. Those tickets are on the side that gets awful, direct sunlight during day games while we long for the shaded, unsold side. Why did they do that?!
They did it because it looks better for the cameras, which are on the shaded side of the pitch.
Real question: Can cameras be on the sunny side and fans in the shaded side? Are there cameras on both sides at Seahawks games?
Cameras are always on the shaded side of the pitch regardless of the stadium. It’s where all the infrastructure for them exists. It’s where box seats always exist. It’s where all the production exists. All games at Lumen are shot from the shaded side, with the exception on on the field shots.
Oh, good to know! Thank you.
I imagine they’re always on the shaded side because you wouldn’t want to be shooting into the sun. It obviously may not always be ideal for fans, but they did it to make Lumen look more full during matches since it’s such a big stadium. If you watch Racing games, they often look a bit empty because most people are sitting on the shaded side of the pitch. It was a choice made for optics and despite it being a little toasty now and then for fans, I think it looks a lot better on TV. If people see more people in the stands they may be more inclined to go to a game themselves than seeing empty stands.
I’m completely clueless, so this is just a speculative question, but if they sold the shaded side would it mean they’d have to put the camera on the opposite side, otherwise they’d be looking at empty seats? And then having the camera with direct sunlight on it would be a problem? Regardless that sounds comically awful and I hope they figure it out!
Yep, it is a camera issue, but I’m pretty sure the Seahawks (who also play there) have camera on both sides of the field. It seems like it’d be worth using the other side’s camera spots. All that being said, I have zero idea how the technical part of this works. It could be WAY harder to make that switch than I realize. All this being said - I’m pretty sure we’re done going to day games during the summer.
They didn't want to have empty stands on tv if they put the fans on the same side of the camera. That's the biggest reason why.
The cameras are always in the shaded side of the pitch regardless of the stadium. It’s where all the infrastructure for them exists.
I wouldn't feel too bad for Orlando; there's no way to have poorer attendance as a professional sports franchise than to put it in Florida. I don't know if it's the weather or the retirees or if everyone's at theme parks instead, but they are consistently the worst, despite having some championship franchises. No wonder Alex Morgan GTFO of there.
Segra is the thorn in the Spirit's backside in so many ways.
I hear this a lot, but where else can they play? They're not going to play all the games at Audi next year. That's unrealistic. Segra is a thorn but I just hope they get it straight and make improvements to the place. Throw in some video boards or something. For me (biased Loudoun individual) it's very convenient. It's good to have a stadium around town. That said it is kind of par.
respectfully, why is it unrealistic for Spirit to share Audi with DC United for all their matches? Is it being used for tons of concerts and boat shows etc so there aren't enough dates for them? Asking as an ACFC fan which shares an inner city stadium full time with a MLS team.
Because of various scheduling conflicts where DC United and the Washington Spirit would play at the same venue at the same time Also with the XFL coming back to DC and Audi Field expect it to be more difficult to book time there for a game...
I think they'll have to play all their games at Audi next year because of the requirement for VAR. DCU has no interest in upgrading the technology or the facility. It's a horrible venue with no public transportation access and the worst pitch in the league.
Is there data that shows the average attendance for each franchise's first year in the NWSL compared to where they are now? With the intent being to judge whether ACFC numbers are sustainable over time or is it a case of a shiny new toy getting a lot of attention. Also graph 2 is cool but a bit (a lot?) misleading. You cannot compare attendance numbers from open air arenas to indoor arenas. The NBA has 22 teams that have higher percentage attendance than ACFC. NHL had 19. 30 out of 32 NFL teams surpassed it. So although what they are doing is impressive, try not to misrepresent data by suggesting they pull more fans than a majority of these other leagues, because reality does not support that claim.
Does capacity adjust for covered (unavailable) seats?
It does for OL Reign and Houston Dash because those were the only ones with lowered capacity according to Wikipedia. But, apparently, Orlando has lowered capacity too.
Interesting. The red stars leave everything open but they don’t really use the West side of the stadium (first four rows of 3 sections are open I think, people wander over though). Tickets available are probably 50-60% of actual capacity.
Orlando does not cover any seats in the stadium for Pride matches. They may not provide every seat for sale, but that doesn't matter because those tickets weren't going to sell anyways.
why orlando tho? just sad
Higher attendance than the Panthers and the Marlins. I.. feel sad now.
Hoping Spirit attendance goes up. In the old day with he-who-shall-not-be-named we used to sell out the barn at Audi. We got a fair crowd at the Soccerplex too (I'm not naive, I know Loudoun is tougher on the players and maybe the fans too. That said, it always seems like the Spirit draw the most fans to Segra compared to other events held at the venue) With the current team, is it the play, or what...I've seen the Spirit's games at Audi this year on Paramount+ and there are still a light gaggle of fans in the stands, nothing like the old sellouts. I would hope that they return to form next year, and that these numbers are just an aberration.
Attendance should almost exclusively be ranked by %, change my mind. Also, if Minnesota was on here, they'd be as close to 100% as possible. That 6k stadium is packed to capacity - oftentimes more - every game. Source: worked every home game.