Quote Originally Posted by Qman View Post
Thats crap. The lions get #1 LOCAL tv numbers in the country. they draw 250k-400k per game on TV, bascially the same as the canucks do locally. Whitecap wouldn't even get close to cracking 100k locally, they just get there national. As well, what you don't the whitecaps still tarp of 1/3rd of the lower bowl, so it looks good on TV. For wednesday games, the whitecaps draw maybe 10-15k, maybe 20k on weekends, 22k for seattle and portland. Lions tix are double the price of whitecaps.

The lions are dealing with what every team deals with when they go from a top team to a middle team, a drop in interest until they start improving. Plus, because local traffic sucks so much now the only people that go to games live in Vancouver city or along a skytrain route. The rest can watch it free in HD without battling traffic. Vancouver is a 25k market, 35k for saskatchewan, 30k after labour day. Its been that way for 30 years
Excellent overview, Qman! The traffic in Vancouver and perhaps in Toronto, is so bad many fans elect not to drive downtown for the games. The consolation is CFL games are terrific in HDTV, but there's nothing like being there!

TFC may have soldout games but the stadium looked less than half full for several games last year. I suspect TFC and Whitecaps have strong corporate sales, unlike the Argos and Lions, and might have a hard time giving away their tickets. There is little comparison between the CFL and MLS on TV. One TFC game last year vs. Chicago drew only 14,000 viewers across Canada...while the Argos are one of the top draws on TV in the league.