By John Fay
The Cincinnati Enquirer

The Reds' crack PR staff checked the record books Wednesday to try to figure out how long it had been since the Reds sold out a day game during the week - other than Opening Day.

The staff could find no such sellout, dating to 1960, as far back as records were available.

They know this much: It never happened at Riverfront Stadium/Cinergy Field.

What brought up the topic was the fact that today's 12:35 p.m. game with the Cubs is sold out. (Standing-room tickets remain.)

A combination of factors led to the SRO draw.

"We do well for these weekday games," Reds marketing director Cal Levy said. "The Cubs and the (St. Louis) Cardinals are the best draws. We also sold a lot of tickets when it was announced that (Sammy) Sosa was coming back."

Today's crowd will be around 42,000. That won't break the record for a weekday crowd. The Reds drew 45,771 on June 29, 2000, for a game with St. Louis. But that was short of a sellout at Cinergy.

Wednesday night's game turned out to be a sellout as well.