The Cleveland Browns ended their 2017 home season on Sunday in front of a crowd of 56,434, their lowest total since returning to the league in 1999.
It's a number that rivaled the team's overall season figure which was also an all-time low of 511,060 or an average of 63,882 a home game which ranks 26th in the league according to ESPN's NFL attendance figures.
It's actually a figure that when it comes to Northeast Ohio fans is really lower, that's because in October when the Browns played the Minnesota Vikings in London it was a Cleveland home game and the crowd of 74,237 figured into that average. Remove it from the equation and the 63,882 average drops to 62,403.
Since Jimmy Haslam's first full year of ownership in 2013 when the team welcomed 569,939, the average is down nearly 59,000 fans a year which is almost equivalent to an extra home game. For the team, given the average ticket price of $75, that's a $4.4 million drop in revenue. For the city, it's a $353-thousand drop in the 8 percent admissions tax collections.
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The team just ahead of the Browns though in the 25th attendance slot is the division-leading Pittsburgh Steelers which is only averaging less than 300 fans more a game than the Browns. But while the Browns were at 85.9 percent of capacity the Steelers in a slightly smaller stadium were at 98.7 percent.
The Dallas Cowboys are number one in the league averaging 92,803 a game or 116 percent of their seating capacity taking into account AT&T Stadium's standing room areas. The New England Patriots on the other hand rank 20th in the league beating the Browns by just under 2,000 fans a game. Their games are at 95.8 percent of capacity.
