2013-14 AHL Season Discussion Topic

[No Fun Shogun]

A lot of turmoil this past offseason. The Rivermen and the Aeros are sadly no more, but the Wild and the Comets join and will hopefully become wildly successful at the gate.

Yet another year, yet another realignment, and yet another new division for Charlotte.

Dark clouds are hovering over the state of Maine, with the Pirates out of Portland and scheduled to spend a year in Lewiston after some.... unpleasantness between them and the city. Only time will tell where they'll be by this time next year.

But a new season is finally upon us, the Griffins seek to repeat as Calder Cup champions, and 29 other teams seek to dethrone the kings from Michigan.

Feel free to discuss any and all events for this AHL season here, folks. And enjoy the best of minor league hockey that there is to find.

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[No Fun Shogun]

Chicago Wolves having attendance issues?

I just checked up on it, and it appears that the Wolves are experiencing one heck of a dip in their attendance so far this year. I was very surprised at how low the attendance was for a Friday night game versus Rockford I attended a couple weeks back, but figured it was an odd exception. Answering a minor league question on the BoH reminded me of it though, so I snooped around on the AHL website. Here's the average attendance the past few seasons....

2005-06: 7,932, 4th in the AHL
2006-07: 7,830, 3rd in the AHL
2007-08: 7,474, 4th in the AHL
2008-09: 7,448, 3rd in the AHL
2009-10: 7,963, 3rd in the AHL
2010-11: 7,453, 3rd in the AHL
2011-12: 7,909, 2nd in the AHL
2012-13: 8,230, 2nd in the AHL
2013-14: 4,813, 13th in the AHL
http://theahl.com/stats/schedule.php...e&season_id=43

Now, granted, it's only been five games so far, versus 40 or 38 for the other seasons, but that's one heck of a significant drop for the Wolves in the first eighth of the season, so I'm not willing to just toss it away as a small sample size.

Can anybody think of reasons for this so far? As I said, I've only been to one game so far this year, but can't think of a logical reason for why their attendance would but almost halved early on. Hockey fandom is bigger than ever in Chicagoland, it's not like the economy has worsened in the span of a few months, or at least not massively, all games are still televised, I doubt that a Hawks Cup win is drawing from them given that the 2010 championship didn't have a noticeably deleterious effect, and I doubt that a lot of fans were turned off by the Wolves picking up the Blues as an affiliate given that they had just been affiliated with the Canucks.

 

[Rumblick]

Isn't that the second affiliate change in as many years? The lack of continuity coupled with the fact that the Wolves missed the playoffs last season (and are off to a slow start this year) could be impacting the numbers. Also, two of them were Sunday afternoon games. Isn't there a football team somewhere in that area?

I think by season's end, they'll be fine as long as the team improves.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Football is probably the big reason, as the Wolves have apparently always been slow out the gate, but still a surprisingly slow start out of the gate.

Doubt change of affiliation did much to keep people away. If anything, given how much more acrimonious the Hawks-Nucks rivalry has been as of late when compared to the Hawks-Blues, it might actually help a tad.

 

[adsfan]

Football is probably the big reason, as the Wolves have apparently always been slow out the gate, but still a surprisingly slow start out of the gate.

Doubt change of affiliation did much to keep people away. If anything, given how much more acrimonious the Hawks-Nucks rivalry has been as of late when compared to the Hawks-Blues, it might actually help a tad.

Chicago starts slow, due to football. High School football to be exact.

Milwaukee starts slow due to a lack of home games and Packers football. When January comes, the Milwaukee attendance jumps from 4500 to 6500 for a weekend game and 2500 to 3500 for a week night. Concert nights will be 10,000 plus.

By the end of the season, Milwaukee will be at 5500 and Chicago at 7500.

 

[MM658]

As others have said, you need to compare apples to apples, like this:

2009-10: 6,222, after 5 games
2010-11: 4,901, after 5 games
2011-12: 6,751, after 5 games
2012-13: 6,361, after 5 games
2013-14: 4,813, after 5 games

The big difference at this point is that on opening night, they drew "only" 9,824 while most years opening night is a crowd greater than 11,000. Last year, for example, was 14,505. That skews a 5-game average quite a bit.

 

[glovesave37]

As others have said, you need to compare apples to apples, like this:

2009-10: 6,222, after 5 games
2010-11: 4,901, after 5 games
2011-12: 6,751, after 5 games
2012-13: 6,361, after 5 games
2013-14: 4,813, after 5 games

The big difference at this point is that on opening night, they drew "only" 9,824 while most years opening night is a crowd greater than 11,000. Last year, for example, was 14,505. That skews a 5-game average quite a bit.

The 2 lowest years of attendance through 5 games are after years the Blackhawks were champs. Coincidence? nope

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Yup, just didn't realize that the Wolves were so slow out of the gate. Makes their repeated rise near to top of the league's attendance all the more impressive.

 

[JimmyHardFace]

Marlies weekend preview from a local writer
http://avrysports.com/2014/02/22/another-weekend-another-two-games-for-the-marlies/