Chix With Tix

It's never good to generalize about women. I'm one, and trust me, we don't like to be stereotyped - at least, most of us don't like it. (Maybe some do. Wouldn't want to generalize.) But when it comes to women who attend men's pro sports here in Philly, there's one inevitable truth about us females. Lady game-goers are the minority.

No surprise there. At least, not if you've been to see the Phils, Flyers, Birds, Sixers or Union and taken a quick look around. Stand outside one of the gates at Lincoln Financial Field 15 minutes before game time. Notice the lines are separated by gender; see the women cruising right in; see the guys shuffle in baby steps and take 10 minutes to pass through security; same deal at halftime, when the uncomfortable delay to enter a restroom can make a fella consider investing in a Stadium Pal, but the queues for women's loos move with relieving swiftness. (Again, not to stereotype, but I believe I represent my gender when I say we consider the no-waiting-to-pee aspect of our minorityness nothing if not a perk.)

Not that we're not at the games, because we are, more than ever. According to ticket offices for all five teams, attendance and season-ticket sales are getting more and more female. The Phillies' ticket sellers, for one, say season-ticket sales to women have increased 30 percent since the team's move to Citizens Bank Park. (The game with the highest attendance by ladies: Mother's Day.) The Flyers report about 30 percent of their seasonal subscribers are women, and the team's front office estimates that the gender mix at games is now roughly 60 percent men, 40 percent women. Similar stuff at the Sixers, where the average attendance of females (12 and older) is about 40 percent, which squares with the NBA's overall numbers. The Union sells 15 percent of its season tickets to women, but says the percentage of women at its games trends much higher. And although the Eagles tend to be inscrutable about these things, longtime ticket-sales dude Leo Carlin - he's been doing his job for 52 seasons - says it's much different than it used to be. At Veterans Stadium, he guesses the ratio was 9-to-1 men to women. The breakdown isn't exactly 1-to-1 today, but the shift toward more women in the stands has been "dramatic."