[Stan Collins]

Thought this was kinda neat. This year, the Seattle Seahawks will play 2 preseason games and 8 regular season games at Qwest. If they sell them all out at a capacity of 67,000, that would be a combined attendance of 670,000.

Here's what soccer drew this year, if we assume the Cup Final draws 42,000:

       03/19 -   Thursday   New York Red Bulls   32,523
       03/28 -   Saturday   Real Salt Lake   28,548
       04/11 -   Saturday   Kansas City Wizards   28,746
       04/25 -   Saturday   San Jose Earthquakes   28,838
       05/10 -   Sunday   Los Angeles Galaxy   29,025
       05/30 -   Saturday   Columbus Crew   29,126
       06/13 -   Saturday   San Jose Earthquakes   28,999
       06/17 -   Wednesday   D.C. United   29,104
       06/28 -   Sunday   Colorado Rapids   32,526
       07/04 -   Saturday   Gold Cup Doubleheader   15,387
       07/11 -   Saturday   Houston Dynamo   32,404
       07/18 -   Saturday   Chelsea FC %   65,289
       07/25 -   Saturday   Chicago Fire   32,405
       08/05 -   Wednesday   FC Barcelona %   66,848
       08/20 -   Thursday   New England Revolution   32,705
       08/29 -   Saturday   Toronto FC   32,679
       09/19 -   Saturday   Chivas USA   32,719
       10/24 -   Saturday   FC Dallas   33,108
       10/29 -   Thursday   Houston Dynamo   35,807

       MLS Cup Final   LA vs RSL   42,000(?)       
  
Total --  688,786

[DarthGreedo]

Thats why I always say, Qwest IS a SSS, only bigger.

[Yoshou]

If you are going to compare sports, you need to include the WSU and EWU games in there... Soccer may outdraw the Seahawks, but pointyball still beats roundball at Qwest.

[SteamPunkr]

Originally Posted by Yoshou

If you are going to compare sports, you need to include the WSU and EWU games in there... Soccer may outdraw the Seahawks, but pointyball still beats roundball at Qwest.

but how many of those college games are there? 2? that's not a whole lot. plus, you got to remember that the sounders only sell half the stadium. if they opened it all up, i'm pretty sure they could average 40-45,000 plus sell out completely for playoffs. all that being said, it's still impressive, that in a country with a reputation for hating soccer and worshiping football like it's a religon, that a soccer club would be on par, and even beat, a football team.

[Yoshou]

Heh. The numbers provided by the OP included the Gold Cup and MLS Cup. Neither of which the Sounders played in. I'm not sure how many beyond 32k the Sounders will be able to bring in, but throwing out numbers is a fool's errand at this point. The Sounders have been able to bring in 36k for playoff games and 32k for regular season so far. Granted, those were all sell-outs so the number is higher than that, but there's no way of knowing how much more.

There were two college football games this year that I can remember, the Cougs brought in 40k+ and the Eagles brought in a little more than 6k, so that means football outdraws soccer in Qwest.

[Bonesaw]

While this is kind of cool, you still have to realise the sounders have had more than twice the opertunities (22 as opposed to 10) to put people in the seats.

Also did you include the preseason games for the seahawks? cus those would add another 100,000ish people.

[koolkeith13]

Originally Posted by Bonesaw

Also did you include the preseason games for the seahawks? cus those would add another 100,000ish people.

I hope not.

You have just entered the BigSoccer "Spin Free Zone" where all facts are reported like Fox News.

[SteamPunkr]

Originally Posted by Yoshou

Heh. The numbers provided by the OP included the Gold Cup and MLS Cup. Neither of which the Sounders played in.


There were two college football games this year that I can remember, the Cougs brought in 40k+ and the Eagles brought in a little more than 6k, so that means football outdraws soccer in Qwest.

i could be wrong, but i'm pretty sure the seachickens didn't play in any college football games!!


but the point isn't who's more popular, the sounders or the seahawks, it's that soccer drew numbers that are comparable to football. no, they didn't sell out the whole stadium, but in this country of jim rome's, the soccer numbers put up are pretty impressive and speak to the shift of popularity in the main stream of the sport.

[WestSeattle]

He counted the preseasons (10x68,000) - 8 of those are real games, 2 of those are "pay full price" pre-season games...one of *the* most annoying things about owning NFL season tickets is paying for those two extra games.

I forgot that the Barcelona game drew slightly more fans than Chelsea!

[Stan Collins]

Yeah, you don't technically need the Gold Cup game, but you do need the Cup Final. I guess one could say that "MLS outdrew the NFL" at Qwest, since other than the Gold Cup game, all the other games involved at least one MLS team.