We'll look at this more in the off-season as a companion piece to the post during the All-Star break detailing attendance from 2008 to 2009, but we can at least do a quick glance at how the season ended, attendance-wise.
The Astros drew (or "sold," depending on the faith you put in attendance counts) 2,521,729 fans this season, down from 2,779,487 in 2008 and 3,030,405 in 2007. This represents a drop of 257,758, or 9.2% from last year (or 16.8% drop from 2007).
This works out to 31,132 fans per game.
Highest paid attendance of 2009: Opening Day vs. Cubs - 43,827
Lowest paid attendance of 2009: June 3 vs. Colorado - 22,032
Could be worse: The Marlins failed to draw 1.5 million fans for the fourth consecutive season, averaging 18,770 fans per game.
Or the Blue Jays. They averaged 23,162 fans per game.
Or how about the Diamondbacks, who saw a 15.2% drop in attendance from 2008.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
