Friday, September 10, 2010

Come on, Seattle!!!

My day job is absorbing all of my non-family time right now as I am trying to secure a promotion that has been two years in the making.

That doesn't mean that I am not obsessing utterly about the Storm and Game 1 of the WNBA Finals this Sunday.

The game is a 12 noon PDT, and will be aired on national, broadcast television on ABC.

Today the Storm are raising a flag with 6000+ season ticket holder names upon it to the top of the Space Needle.

According to TicketMaster there are only 16 (released for sale) seats left in the lower bowl of Key Arena for Sunday's game. That includes a single ticket in Section 120 and two blocks of "obstructed view" seats behind the baskets Sections 107 and 121 (my section!). The upper bowl has sold enough of the released seats to force the organization to open 5 additional sections of seating, which now have less than 50 seats available remaining. There are 14 additional upper bowl sections which have not yet been made available for sales.

Seattle is a basketball town.

Last year, the NBA's Indiana Pacers and Phoenix Sun coaches and players bought out the upper bowls of their arenas and gave the tickets away to fans to get people in the seats.

The last time we had a championship basketball game in Seattle (2004), those seats were all filled without a grand gesture and masses of free tickets. I was relegated to sitting in nosebleed seats in the next to the last row of the upper bowl. This time I will be in my own seat, 3rd row behind the visitor basket, right in the action.

I know the Seahawks will open their season this Sunday a few hours after this game. I know tailgating is part of the NFL football experience. I still hope to see a bunch of people in Seahawks gear at Sunday's WNBA game for the rare experience of a day of sports. Watch their local champions in the WNBA Finals and then head to Qwest Field for opening day.

Come on Seattle. We don't need the NBA to sell out our Finals. We can buy up those seats and remind everyone that this IS a basketball town. Come in your Seahawks gear, come in your Huskies gear, come in your Sonics gear, best of all, buy some Storm gear and come in that. A championship series game does not come along very often in this city. The crowd will be crazy, the players will play with every ounce of talent and passion they possess.

The bandwagon has 3,000-4,000 seats worth of room remaining for you. It doesn't matter if you leave a die hard WNBA fan or walk away with some more fodder for Sports Radio on why the WNBA doesn't matter. Just buy the dang tickets and come to the game. Bring your girlfriend, your wife, your daughter, your niece, that hot barista with the diamond in her right nostril you have been chatting up in the mornings, or be like me and bring your sons....just come on out.