Nobody And I Mean Nobody Went To Rays-Rangers Wild-Card Game 1 In Tampa

The Tampa Bay Rays fanbase continue to find ways to impress.

While Yankees and Mets fans would do anything to have their teams be in this year's MLB postseason, Tampa fans are telling them to 'hold their beer,' and not even bothering to show up to their games.

THE RAYS FINISHED 99-63

During Game 1 of the AL Wild Card, just 19,704 Rays fans showed up to Tropicana Field to see the team face the Texas Rangers in the best-of-three series. That attendance is the lowest EVER for a playoff game since 1919 (outside of the Covid year). On top of that, the Rays had the fourth best record in all of the Majors! It's not like they don't have a chance to make a real run in the playoffs.

I mean this isn't the Oakland A's were talking about here.

IT'S THE PLAYOFFS!

Tuesday's pitiful attendance was less than 29 of the 62 home games the Rays had during the regular season. That means more people cared about a random ass game in the middle of a sweltering hot and humid July than the actual thing the season is all about by playing in the playoffs.

And just to show the Rays organization how much they don't care about their team, a preseason Lightning vs Florida Panthers game had more people in attendance for a game that didn't even matter than the Rays did.

Yes, the game was in the afternoon but to not even crack 20,000 people is crazy to me. I had multiple friends whose parents took them out of school for the afternoon Yankees playoffs games when the Yanks were actually good in the late 90s. You mean to tell me people in FLORIDA of all places are caring more about education than having fun? Please.

The Rays ownership is becoming so increasingly frustrated with its fanbase that in 2019 it tried doing a "split season" between Tampa and Montreal but ultimately the plan was rejected by the league. Instead, the team has now opted to build a 30,000 seat stadium in St. Petersburg but that's not likely to be finished until 2028.

That means the Rays organization and the players will have at least four more years of showing up to a practically empty ballpark with the realization that your fans hate you. Talk about baseball being a game of mental toughness!

We'll see if they can even break the record by having a lesser attendance today when the Rays host the Rangers at 3 p.m. ET. Tampa trails 1-0 in the series.