Not only did the Albuquerque Isotopes have the cutest promotion in minor league baseball yesterday, the Pacific Coast League franchise also drew the biggest crowd in the sport.
The Isotopes passed out a team card set featuring players posing with dogs from a local animal rescue to the first 3,000 fans at Isotopes Park last night. I know. How great is that? So great that it helped them draw 8,222 fans last night, tops in the minors (the complete attendance top 20 can be found at the bottom of this post).
Other teams have done similar promotions. For example, each year Baltimore Orioles players pose with their dogs at Camden Yards for a calendar that benefits the Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter.
The goal of the Albuquerque’s promotion was to raise awareness about homeless pets in the area. Players came out to Animal Humane earlier in the week for an adoption event. All of the dogs featured in the player cards have been adopted.
While we’re at it, here’s another shot from the card set.
OK. Now on to the statistics. The top 20 teams in minor league attendance from last night: