The Washington Wizards have an attendance problem.
The Wizards play in Capital One Arena, one of the highest-capacity arenas in the NBA. Capital One’s 20,356-person capacity is surpassed by only the United Center in Chicago (20,917) and the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia (20,478).
The NBA’s two largest arenas hosted two non-playoff teams this season in the Bulls and 76ers, yet those two teams led the NBA in total attendance this season. The Wizards in the third-largest arena ranked second-to-last ahead of only the Atlanta Hawks in total attendance and last in average attendance per game.
Look around at any home Wizards game over the past couple of seasons and you will see a vast ocean of empty chairs. Don’t tell the kind folks over at Monumental, but when I was a freshman in college in 2021-22, my friends and I used to buy upper bowl Wizards tickets and then sneak down to the open rows in the 100s.
The Wizards’ struggles with attendance are largely a product of a fanbase that is understandably worn down from years of mediocrity that immediately gave way to a full rebuild. Two facts indicate that this is likely a temporary lull.
The Wizards used to be good with attendance
During the mid-2010s, the Wizards were consistently a middle-of-the-pack team attendance-wise, which is decently impressive considering those decent Wizards teams were never any real threat to win a championship, they were just a fun playoff team.
Accurate attendance figures from the 1970s are nearly impossible to find, so I can’t comment on what the Wizards’ attendance looked like the last time they were a championship contender.
But good attendance figures from relatively recently indicate that the Wizards’ fanbase is merely tempering their most enthusiastic support until the team returns to putting a competitive product out on the floor, and rightfully so.
The Thunder were also once at the bottom of the league
Throw away the 2020-21 season, which saw varyingly limited crowds attending NBA games based on different cities’ COVID protocols. During the Oklahoma City Thunder’s post-Westbrook rebuild, they were fourth-to-last in both total and average attendance in 2021-22 and dead last in total attendance in 2022-23.
Fast forward to today, and the 68-14 Thunder squad drew top-half attendance to one of the smaller arenas in the league. Turn on any Thunder playoff game, and the crowd is exploding out of the television speakers and unanimously sporting matching t-shirts.
Thus, in-season attendance should not be used as a metric to measure fan loyalty. I have always been of the belief that Wizards fans are some of the most loyal and passionate in the NBA, a sentiment I think the rest of the league’s fans will come to learn once the Wizards are relevant once again.