How do you justify these football attendance numbers?

Quote:Howard 7,668
Ball St. 5,402
Ohio 3,257
Western Michigan 2,177
Bowling Green 1,751

I'm not trying to talk smack, or be negative in anyway. I'm just curious as someone who knows nothing of EMU athletics, why is it this bad?

not an emu fan, but

poor fanbase
in the shadow of the big house
small town
bland stadium situated away from student housing with little game day atmosphere
crappy team
no one in Ypsilanti wants to do anything outside in November other than rake leaves with a scowl on their face

(04-25-2014 02:23 AM)PirateJP Wrote:  How do you justify these football attendance numbers? ... I'm not trying to talk smack, or be negative in anyway.

Then the word you are looking for is "explain".

"Justify" literally means, "Hey, EMU fans, prove that these attendance numbers are right or reasonable", which clearly is talking smack, even if you hadn't been trying to.

i think he means how do you justify the validity of being a major college football program with such low attendance. the insinuation is "what is the reason your attendance is so pitiful".

I think emu is just in a tough spot with football. they have seldom been good or had lots of fan support although there were years in the 80s and 90s when they were decent and put 8-12k in the stands. then again, they were a dropped td pass away from knocking off mich st in 2012 so sometimes its a clutch play or two that can change momentum in a program (or drop it).

For ***** sake lock this **** down. **** is ****** up and bull****.

Dear PirateJP,
It boils down to winning. When you have twenty years of losing football, fans stop coming. People, whether students, alumni, home towners, etc. want to see winning teams. When it lasts twenty years everyone gets discouraged and stops showing up for the games.
During the mid to late eighties we had several games of close to the 20,000 in attendance, and that was because we were winning games. I do not believe it has much to do with the nearness of U-M, and our stadium is no more bland then others in the MAC. It has to do with winning games. If Eastern can pull together some winning seasons under Coach Creighton, the attendance will come back. Check any school that has had losing records for ten years or more, and you will see drop offs in attendance.

Any football program that's sucked as much as EMU has will see crappy attendance in the long run, it doesn't matter if you're EMU or ECU. The extra factors, like Michigan and the commuter nature of the campus, just compound the problem.

Not to feed the troll, but I think it is worth noting that when looking at these numbers EMU's ACTUAL attendance is likely not that much worse than many other programs who REPORT much higher attendance.

A few years back a local paper (perhaps the student paper) ran an article demonstrating the inconsistency between what EMU's REPORTED attendance and its ACTUAL attendance. From that time on I believe they have reported actual attendance, which makes theirs appear much worse than many others who have basically the same number of people attending the games but whose attendance, on paper, appear much higher.

Someone please correct me if I am wrong.

(04-25-2014 09:00 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

Wrong pic. The fish is already on the hook!

For NIU fans.....just wondering how many people were in the stands in 1997

Anyway, question for ECU fans, since its baseball season rather than FB season, what's with the slide in your baseball attendance? In 2010 you were in the top 20, with over 3,200 per game, and now you've fallen out of the top 25 with less than 2,500? How do you justify that?

(04-25-2014 11:56 AM)BruceMcF Wrote:  Anyway, question for ECU fans, since its baseball season rather than FB season, what's with the slide in your baseball attendance? In 2010 you were in the top 20, with over 3,200 per game, and now you've fallen out of the top 25 with less than 2,500? How do you justify that?

A bad coach that somehow still has a job. His contract is up at the end of the year so hopefully that problem will be rectified. We just had over 4300 at the UNC game last week. A few years ago that would have easily been over 5000.

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(04-25-2014 11:35 AM)indianasniff Wrote:  For NIU fans.....just wondering how many people were in the stands in 1997

If you want to get smart.... four of our top 30 games ever attended in football came from the years 1995-1998 (Which were the dark days of our program) from this 2009 posting. Obviously 1-2 of those attendance numbers dropped out of the top 30 based off of recent years but you get the point. No one is bashing EMU for their attendance besides the ECU guy, so no reason to get all upset over it.

http://www.redandblackattack.com/pages/niu-attendance

(04-25-2014 01:46 PM)PirateJP Wrote:  A bad coach that somehow still has a job.

So that explains why you are out trolling during baseball season rather than following your own school's team.

(04-25-2014 02:45 PM)BruceMcF Wrote:  

(04-25-2014 01:46 PM)PirateJP Wrote:  A bad coach that somehow still has a job.

So that explains why you are out trolling during baseball season rather than following your own school's team.

Nope, not at all. I still go to games when I can, I just don't live close enough to get down as much as I would like. No reason I can't support the kids, even though I disagree with the coach.


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(04-25-2014 09:22 AM)IULurker Wrote:  Not to feed the troll, but I think it is worth noting that when looking at these numbers EMU's ACTUAL attendance is likely not that much worse than many other programs who REPORT much higher attendance.

A few years back a local paper (perhaps the student paper) ran an article demonstrating the inconsistency between what EMU's REPORTED attendance and its ACTUAL attendance. From that time on I believe they have reported actual attendance, which makes theirs appear much worse than many others who have basically the same number of people attending the games but whose attendance, on paper, appear much higher.

Someone please correct me if I am wrong.

Some people who have been to EMU and Ball State games think they are actually under reporting, especially Ball State. Some posters theorize that it is partially due to hand counting students and the like rather than using electronic counters. Of course it could just be a bad theory.

(04-25-2014 09:00 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

How can others not realize this is what he wanted?

(04-25-2014 07:33 PM)MidnightBlueGold Wrote:  

(04-25-2014 09:00 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

How can others not realize this is what he wanted?

Ehhh...I never got involved in the EMU attendance discussion threads in the past and always felt bad for their posters because the EMU fans that are on this board are all good posters...except for Tred Barta and his love letters...he's an odd bird sometimes. Anyway, after meeting all of their fans this winter up in Ypsilanti I say give 'em hell about their attendance lol.