Have you noticed that various blogs across the Flyer-verse are doing a giveaway featuring tickets to Thursday’s clash with Nashville? Well it’s an orchestrated effort to get butts in seats for the festivities of Claude Giroux’s 1,000th NHL game. The front office was clearly not happy with the projected attendance numbers and has resorted to dishing out an unknown, but likely large, number of free tickets to artificially pad the numbers to fill up the Wells Fargo Center for Giroux’s big night.
In years past, a milestone 15 years in the making should’ve been an automatic sellout, but the attendance at the Wells Fargo Center has been disappointing all season long. The Flyers are currently 17th in the league in average attendance (16,504) for the 2021-22 season, a huge fall from third place as recently as 2018-19 (20,371).
But hey, this is a time to praise the Flyers because they clearly learned a lesson from a disastrous Hall of Fame induction back in November when the pre-game ceremonies took place in front of an empty Wells Fargo Center. Their horrible treatment of Paul Holmgren and Rick Tocchet went down as a huge black mark on the franchise. The aura was that of a funeral procession rather than a celebration of two of the biggest stars the franchise had known. They clearly want more people in attendance and a better vibe for Giroux, so even if it comes at the cost of hundreds of complimentary tickets, at least it’ll look better on TV.
So, well done, Flyers. You did something right. I guess.
By: Dan Esche (@DanTheFlyeraFan)
photo credit: nhl.com
brotherlypuck.com 