PhilBlackson wrote:Quattro wrote:PhilBlackson wrote:You can’t tell the story of this franchise, particularly its immense growth in popularity without mentioning Vince (the franchise was farm league level playing in an embarrassingly empty Skydome before him) so hang the damn banner and the rest of you deal with it! lol
We were even worse after he left. People need to stop with this revisionist history that he somehow made this team what it is today. We were ****, Vince came and sprayed a lot of dunks around and created some interest for maybe 3 years, then he stopped dunking, then stopped trying, left and then we were **** again.
In terms of popularity…that’s a damn lie lol
The attendance in Damon’s era was humiliating as was the media coverage- they might as well have been the Argos unless Jordan happened to be in town lol. They didn’t even sell the lower bowl in the Skydome. It was literally extra seating that they created to better frame the court because the skydome wasn't designed for a basketball court.
The Bosh era which was right after VC EASILY had a much higher attendance and FAR more media coverage than Damon’s. Was it as good as what it became during the DD/Lowry aka We The North era?! No of course not because fans never tune into losing vs winning teams but you’re outta your mind or were just a kid if you think it was comparable to Damon’s era.
Vince created massive growth and interest. The numbers obviously dropped when he was gone because again that’s part of having a losing product but it’s laughable if you’re acting like attendance, media coverage etc were as bad as it was before Vince. You literally can read through this forum or just ask most fans who are of the age to have been around from the beginning and ask when they either started to watch or became serious fans of the team and the answer is VC era. Heck listen to the current Canadian players which Raptor inspired them…it wasn’t Damon or Bosh lol Vince undeniably grew the sport no matter how butthurt some of you are about how it ended.
No I wasn't a kid. I was buying tickets to see this team before, during and after Vince. And I can assure you, despite your recollections, that there were PLENTY of empty seats at the ACC in the years after he left. Don't take my word for it, attendance numbers are available for everyone to see. I have fond memories of the dude who used to sit in my section and who used to show up to every game with a paper bag over his head painted in raptors colors and scream obsecenties at our players all game long.
As for pre Vince attendance, you conveniently leave out the facts that this was an expansion team playing in a hockey city and playing in an unbelievably horrible stadium.
There's no question Carter in his prime brought massive attention to this team both north and south of the border. Just stop pretending he was some sort of saviour or that he somehow put this team "on the map". Nothing changed after he left. In fact, all he really did was reinforce the stereotype that nobody wanted to play here.
*INGRAM*ALLSTARSEASON*
