Milwaukee Bucks averaged 13,000 fans per night

[RyDogg66]

This isnt a Bucks love/hate thread. That isnt why this was created. It was created on a baseball forum to discuss my displeasure that in April FSN shows the Bucks rather than the Brewers. Apparantly the rest of Wisconsin, minus 13k, agrees with me. This tread is out of frustration to not being able to watch the team I love, not out of hating the Bucks.

[Invader3K]

Don't get me wrong, I would rather see the Brewers in April than the Bucks (especially when the Bucks are woefully out of contention). I do think people will come back around if the Bucks are competitive again.

[danzig6767]

For me it isnt so much the Bucks as it is the NBA. I can watch Hockey, Baseball and Football games that dont involve local teams and be really into them. I cant sit through 15 minutes of Lakers/Heat or Spurs/Celtics or anything like that. The product is just so boring. Yeah, the fact the Bucks stink doesnt help, but even if they were the 2011 Bulls I would have a hard time getting into a regular season game.

I also prefer football, baseball, hockey, and college basketball to the NBA, but i do think the NBA playoffs at this time is generally top notch basketball given the pretty high influx of good players into the league over the last 5-10 years. The overall quality of play in the NBA in my opinion is better than it's been in awhile.

 

That said, if someone just doesn't care for the NBA product in general, they won't tune in enough to see the high quality of play out there by watching the playoffs at least. FWIW, that's all of the NBA i watch besides the Bucks. Pretty much the same with pro hockey, except i have no local team to cheer for so i don't watch much NHL until the playoffs start.

 

As for the Bucks, it should be no surprise that ratings were poor, as was attendance. The Bucks were not only a bad team, their offense was absolutely abysmal. It was usually brutal to watch, no entertainment value at all. Countless games of the Bucks losing by scores of like 91-84 or 86-79. Just ugly basketball. For example, the Bucks were a whopping 30-11 in games they scored at least 90 points and 5-36 when they scored less than 90 points. Of course all teams will have a noticeably better record under the same criteria, but it shows just how pathetic the offense was while at the same time the defense generally was good.

 

Unless Hammond can pull multiple rabbits out of his hat after the atrocious offseason he had last year, the next Bucks season/team will likely be bad to mediocre, and far from very entertaining to watch.

[greeg35]

His point was that this is the first bucks thread he could remember specifically for that purpose.

 

 

Fair enough, I didn't express myself well. What I meant was that almost any thread having anything to do with the bucks contains posts that are there just to express how much the NBA/Bucks suck or how much they don't care about them.

[wisconsinfan47]

Every year its incredibly frustrating that we miss early season Brewers games because the Bucks season is still going on. I haven't cared about the Bucks since Ray Ray was here and I haven't been to a game since Lebrons rookie year. I know there are some Bucks fans and NBA fans that post here but for me, the Bucks and the league itself could go away and I wouldn't miss a second of it.

This is pretty much how I feel. I'll watch them and root for them if I'm in a sports mood and nothing else is on, but even in 2001 the Bucks didn't get me as excited as the Badgers, Packers, or Brewers ever have. Whatever excitement there was left with Ray.

[Buckhunts]

I figured I would bump this thread vs. starting a whole new one, but if people feel as thought it should have its own thread, feel free. The announced attendance was 17K, but I was at the game and there is no way there was 17K there. The BC holds 18K+ for basketball and I would say there was, at most, 14K there. Normally that would be good for the Bucks, but with it being the home opener and no school for kids to go to the next day, I still feel it was disappointing.

[brettac1]

It was better than what Charlotte drew the night before. That was pretty pathetic looking on TV. Half-empty to start the game.

[Corn Trader]

This is my first year as a season ticket holder on my own for the Bucks and I would have to say that I've been more than impressed by what they've done so far. The perks with my package have been great and the service excellent. It was a nice surprise when I showed up before the gates opened and they ushered us in ahead of time, giving us $10 gift cards on the way in. A lot of the reps were stopping by their clients seats to thank them for returning, which I thought was a nice touch.

 

The crowd the other night filled in pretty well after the game started and was actually a hot crowd for the entire first half, mostly due to some truly awful officiating.

 

Everyone talks about the great baseball tradition in Milwaukee when no one showed up for Brewers games until the team showed promise. If anything, we've got a much greater basketball tradition in Milwaukee than baseball. In a city filled with front runners, the Bucks have been in a rough spot for a while. Still, two seasons back, the Bucks showed they have the ability to sell out playoff games and make the BC a really tough place to play.

[dadofandrew]

I still get e-mails from the Bucks offering me deals, and we haven't been to a game in years. They try hard, no doubt.

[3Putt]

I took my son to a mid week Bucks game last year. The place was half empty so we thought we may as well move up a few seats. Unfortunately the ushers have a strict policy that you have to sit in your assigned seat. We won't be back.

[yoshii8]

Don't most professional sports franchises have that policy? I still think a good NBA game is the best live sporting event in Wisconsin.

[RockCoCougars]

I think that the Bucks games are more kid friendly than Brewers games- especially for the under 10 set. The games are shorter, and all the noise, etc., seems to hold their interest better. Kick in the promotions that the Bucks have ran for the past several years, and it's cheaper as well.

[Buckhunts]

Corn Trader wrote:

 

Everyone talks about the great baseball tradition in Milwaukee when no one showed up for Brewers games until the team showed promise. If anything, we've got a much greater basketball tradition in Milwaukee than baseball. In a city filled with front runners, the Bucks have been in a rough spot for a while. Still, two seasons back, the Bucks showed they have the ability to sell out playoff games and make the BC a really tough place to play.

I'm not impressed by selling out playoffs games. I EXPECT playoff games to be sold out, just like I expect the home opener after a lockout that takes place during the winter break for kids to be a sell out as well. The reason I have little faith that the Bucks will be around in 10+ years without a new arena is that if the team is bad, they have nothing to market (outside the opposing team and/or players). There is no tailgating option downtown and I have no desire to go to bar or restaurant and spend a bunch of money multiple times a year. Parking can be cheap or even free but it involves getting there earlier or parking in places that I do not have a lot of faith in. Unless the Bucks have a multiyear run of success I do not think they will ever have the "tradition" that they had in the 70's and 80's. The NBA has changed so much since then and has left teams and markets similar to Milwaukee behind.

[Corn Trader]

I don't think tradition needs to be in quotes there.

 

I don't understand the amount of hate that comes towards downtown Milwaukee. One of the biggest successes in the state over the past decade has been revitalizing the downtown area (including the Third Ward) and yet I hear most people talk about it like its Escape from from New York or Judgement Night or something. The Bucks fall victim to this more than anything.

[thebruce44]

They traded away my favorite player (Allen) and I haven't really followed them since. I'm now just a Wade and Rose fan. At least college basketball is awesome.

[Corn Trader]

The "College Basketball is better than the NBA" argument is one I will never understand. I've got season tickets for UWM and for the Bucks and the level of basketball being played at the Cell isnt even close to the same quality.

[Buckhunts]

I have nothing against Downtown. I was born in Milwaukee, went to Marquette University and love going downtown for a night out, but there are still areas in which I do not want to leave my car for 3-4 hours. North of the Ace Hardware store is one of them. I think the sigma of downtown, at least as it related to the BC, would be gone if they ever decided to do something with the are between 4 and 6th street between Juneau and McKinnley and if the Pabst Brewery renovations would be completed.

 

As for the college basketball vs Pros thing, when people say college basketball is better then the pros, I think they are referring to the bigger college programs (Duke, UNC, Wisconsin, MU, UCLA, ect.). I have nothing against UWM basketball and hope they succeed as it is fun to see the smaller schools excel and make it into the tournament, but when people watch college basketball, they are more connected to the teams thus making the entire game more enjoyable. If the NBA ever decided to start marketing the teams versus the players, maybe more people would be Bucks fans versus Kobe, Lebron, or Wade fans.

[Corn Trader]

I understand the following one of the front running teams even less when we are saying it's a better game. The likelihood of seeing a completely one sided snoozer is so much greater watching a Duke or a North Carolina than anything. Who enjoys watching Duke blast UNC-Greensboro by 40? Last year, 21 of Duke's 32 wins were by 15 points or more. College basketball is a lot like hockey. Playoff hockey is really awesome, but no one wants to watch Carolina play San Jose on a random January night. The NCAA tournament is great, but there are 30+ games played before that, a majority of which are not competitive.

[trwi7]

Corn Trader wrote:

---

Playoff hockey is really awesome, but no one wants to watch Carolina play San Jose on a random January night.

Uhh, same can be said about the NBA or even MLB. Nobody wants to watch Milwaukee play Memphis on a random January night. Nobody wants to watch Oakland play Baltimore on a random June night.

[TheCrew07]

I'm a huge college basketball fan and I could care less for the pro game. Didn't care that they were locked out, don't care now that they are playing again. I briefly got back into the NBA when Big Dog played for them as he was someone I may or may not have heckled in college and he turned out to be a pretty good guy. When the big 3 got to the conference finals and lost that was pretty much it for me as a Bucks fan. I watched a ton of NBA basketball when I was younger, I was a huge Lakers and Bucks fan through the 80s. I lost touch when I was in college and the Bulls were making their big run and watching now, the style of play just doesn't appeal to me.

 

The NBA is full of amazing athletes that aren't very good basketball players, not compared to previous generations. As a basketball player and fan I prefer a more team orientated style than the isolation/break players down off the dribble style of the NBA. That's why I prefer the college game, I don't find myself marveling in the athleticism of the NBA, I find myself irritated by the way the game is officiated (especially traveling/continuation) and the offensive schemes. I played a ton of outdoor basketball in college and I really enjoyed playing in the elements and the more physical and loose nature of the play, and I do enjoy watching it occasion when I come across it on TV. However once the game actually counts I wanted the game officiated properly and I feel no different towards the NBA, the street/playground concepts are better left outside of organized basketball.

 

I might be in the minority, but there has always been a distinction in mind between indoor and outdoor hoops, they are 2 different games, the outside game doesn't have anywhere near the same presence when playing outdoors.

[Kelbysdaddy]

i think the bucks having jon leuer might help. if they kept jimmer instead of drafting and trading him that could have helped attendance. i say that because the badger tie in with leuer and how much hype came with jimmer coming out of college- not because they are white.

[brettac1]

i think the bucks having jon leuer might help. if they kept jimmer instead of drafting and trading him that could have helped attendance. i say that because the badger tie in with leuer and how much hype came with jimmer coming out of college- not because they are white.

Being white certainly would be a reason a lot of fans would love them, whether it's conscious or not.

[Corn Trader]

Leuer has been getting huge pops from the home crowds. His alma mater is the perfect example of how awful the college game can be. Up until the last two years, I've been a lifer for Wisconsin basketball, but Bo Ryan completely killed my will to want to watch college basketball. I'll watch it like I watch minor league baseball now, checking out the future pro talent. There was just a Grantland article about how Bo Ryan could kill the college game and I couldn't agree more.

 

For the record, if you think the NBA doesn't play a team game, look at the percentage of baskets in college basketball that come off of an assist compared to the NBA. Isolation is much more prevalent in the average college basketball game than most think, mostly due to the gap in talent between schools and abusing certain match ups. If you watched the Bulls-Clippers game last night, there won't be a college game played at near that level this season, with Rose and Paul playing the point guard position as well as anyone ever has.

[jjkoestler]

Leuer has been getting huge pops from the home crowds. His alma mater is the perfect example of how awful the college game can be. Up until the last two years, I've been a lifer for Wisconsin basketball, but Bo Ryan completely killed my will to want to watch college basketball. I'll watch it like I watch minor league baseball now, checking out the future pro talent. There was just a Grantland article about how Bo Ryan could kill the college game and I couldn't agree more

Wisconsin: The Most Boring Team in America - In summation, Wisconsin is a boring team that doesn't play pretty basketball, but they win. The article is an interesting read. I particularly liked "Ryan is like a stubborn auteur filmmaker with a strange aesthetic that

becomes more pronounced over time. He's the David Lynch of basketball

coaches."

 

"Now, pretend you're a coach at a BCS conference in Division I. Your

school is middle of the pack or lower, and you struggle to recruit

against the high-profile teams. Why wouldn't you adapt Ryan's style?

Doesn't it make sense? He routinely beats teams with more talented

players, and he's building something like a legacy in Madison. You don't

need to worry about stars; Ryan's best player this season is Jordan

Taylor, and he's averaging just 11.8 points per game. All you need are

guys who are willing to work hard, forsake glory, and submit totally to a

system of patience and discipline."

 

Why is this a bad thing?

 

Corntrader - You were a "lifer for Wisconsin basketball" until 2 years ago. What made you give up your lifelong allegiance? Because the game is boring? The Badgers are consistently one of the most fundamentally sound teams in the country.

[trwi7]

He gave up being a Wisconsin fan but he has season tickets to the Bucks whose coach is most like Bo Ryan in the NBA.