"The average paid attendance for the 2005 season was 10,746 per match, or 29 percent less than the 15,108 'official attendance' reported by the league."
[SNIP]
"Only one team, the Los Angeles Galaxy, had an average paid attendance above 13,000 last season, and six of the 12 teams were below 10,000."
[SNIP]
"The L.A. Galaxy easily outdistanced its MLS brethren in ticket sales last year, with an average paid attendance of 19,940. The next best team was Real Salt Lake at 12,689. FC Dallas was last at 6,634."
Given what I saw the last time I caught an FC Dallas home game, this last one certainly shouldn't surprise anyone. Still, those numbers just sucks.
For all that, though, this is neither surprising nor is it all that distressing. While the league undoubtedly forgoes some revenue by handing out free tickets, it's not just cash shovelled out the door. To begin, asses in seats are asses in seats; it makes the game look and sound better if nothing else. Second, what fans aren't spending on tickets, they can spend on concessions, funny hats, ugly shirts, etc. In other words, it's not implausble to argue these free tickets don't generate some revenue. And, obviously, those tickets puff up the attendance numbers and, which is useful for waving in the face of advertisers and the like. Is it dishonest? Yeah, but it's not unique to MLS either.
The more concrete business seems to come with the question of tickets distributed - e.g. the number of heads that should actually be avaiable for counting on game day. It turns out there's a bit of hanky-panky there as well:
"On average, announced attendance was 9 percent higher than the total number of tickets distributed and at some games close to 50 percent higher despite MLS' stated policy of using tickets distributed to determine its announced attendance figures."
[SNIP]
"[Major League Soccer's] 2006 media guide says 'a record 2.9 million fans attended MLS regular season games' in 2005. But the Game Attendance Summary reports only 2.65 million total tickets were distributed, and of those just over 2 million were paid tickets."
The second of those two does better in painting the big picture - and, applying some of the above speculation about the behavior of fans who received free tickets, a gap of 250,000 (between the 2.9 and 2.65 million) makes for less worrisome reading than a gap of 900,000 (between 2.9 and 2 million).
The most galling thing in all this arises from MLS's half-foolish penchant for secrecy. Getting caught in a lie, by simply implying there's something horrible to hide, raises the odds of getting bit on the ass by a PR loss - and, as suggested both above and in the article, MLS isn't behaving much differently than any sports league. So long as the league gives away tickets to the right people - here, I'm thinking youth groups, disadvantaged kids, families; hell, I've been a reasonable candidate for such treatment in the past (and would have made it worth their while at the "liquid" concession stand to boot) - it's certainly not a bad thing.
So...are they giving it away to the "right people," those who fit the above description? The smart money is on no - and probably for the same reasons I pointed out about concessions, etc.
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