2012 Baseball Attendance

Figures here are per home game.

1. Philadelphia	44,021
2. N.Y. Yankees	43,733
3. Texas	42,719
4. San Francisco	41,695
5. Los Angeles	41,040
6. St. Louis	40,272
7. Anaheim	37,799
8. Boston	37,567
9. Detroit	37,383
10. Chicago Cubs	35,589
11. Milwaukee	34,955
12. Minnesota	34,275
13. Colorado	32,474
14. Washington	30,010
15. Atlanta	29,878
16. Cincinnati	28,978
17. N.Y. Mets	28,035
18. Miami	27,400
19. Arizona	26,884
20. Baltimore	26,610
21. San Diego	26,218
22. Pittsburgh	26,148
23. Toronto	25,921
24. Chicago White Sox	24,271
25. Kansas City	21,748
26. Seattle	21,258
27. Oakland	20,728
28. Houston	19,848
29. Cleveland	19,797
30. Tampa Bay	19,255

Considering the way their respective seasons went, you'd think Philly and Tampa would have switched figures.  But the Phils sold out Citizens Bank Park every single game.  Contrast that with the Rays, whose fan base really is a disgrace.  Their stupid dome is, too.

Charlotte, North Carolina just broke ground for a 10,000-seat downtown ballpark which should be ready for Opening Day 2014.  If they were smart, they'd have built a 25,000-seat park capable of expansion to 40,000, and they'd lure the Rays.  We wouldn't even have to move them out of the AL East.

Along those same lines, maybe the A's run to the postseason will help spur local government to finally approve a new ballpark for them, because they gotta get out of the Coliseum, which, after Tropicana Field, is the worst stadium in the majors now that the Twins are out of the Metrodome.

As for the Mets' figure of 28,035, in the immortal words of former Yankee pitcher Jim Bouton, "Yeah, surrrre!" Maybe that's how many tickets they sold, but as for who showed up, it was probably a lot less than that.

The low figures for Houston and Cleveland are understandable: The former lost 107 games this season, after losing 106 last season, and you gotta be really bad to lose 107 without being an expansion team age 5 seasons or less; and the latter, really all of Northern Ohio, got hammered by the Bush Recession and still hasn't recovered, although manufacturing is up and creating jobs there.  In Seattle's case, they're not horrendous, they just don't have any stars, especially now that Ichiro Suzuki has been dumped off on the Yankees.  But with Safeco Field, a passionate fan base and a growing metro area all in place, the Mariners are in no danger of moving.

Indeed, except for the A's, I don't think any team will move in the next few years, because there just isn't another ballpark available.  Montreal's got the Olympic Stadium, but there's nothing with which to replace it. The problem is, to bring an MLB team to your city -- expansion or moved -- you're not just talking about building one new ballpark.  In effect, you have to build two: Either a temporary, 25-to-30,000-seatt stadium from scratch, or a major renovating job on an existing stadium; and then an entirely new stadium from scratch.

Because of their new ballpark, Miami's attendance was up 46 percent over last season.  Because of their revivals, those of Washington were up 24 percent and Baltimore 22.  The Yankees were down 3 percent, but it doesn't really matter.  The Mets, officially, were down 3.5 percent, but it looks like a lot more.

Milwaukee was down 8 percent, Seattle 9, Colorado 10 (a bad season), Minnesota 12 (a bad season and the novelty of the new ballpark has worn off), Cleveland 13 and Houston 22.