In season’s past, gauging when there would be large crowds at T-Mobile Park wasn’t difficult. Besides opening day, the largest crowds came on giveaway nights and warm weekends during the summer.

Meanwhile, weekday games in April and May, with miserable temps and school still in session, rarely drew big crowds unless perhaps a marquee team with more of a national fan base like the Yankees, Cubs or Dodgers were in town.

But even after a contentious offseason that started with fan upheaval over comments made Jerry Dipoto during an end-of-season news conference and grew into overall raging discontent caused by salary-dumping trades to create payroll flexibility and the revelation of no major increases to the player payroll, the Mariners have still drawn larger-than-expected crowds this season.

According to their announced attendance figures, which go by tickets sold, the Mariners, coming into Monday, had drawn 647,784 fans overall in their 22 home games, which was seventh highest in MLB. They were averaging 29,445 fans, which was 14th best in MLB and sixth in the AL.

Over Mother’s Day weekend, where the weather was perfect, the Mariners had three crowds of more than 30,000 — 39,743 on Friday, 32,398 on Saturday and 41,609 on Sunday — despite playing the Oakland A’s. They’ve had 12 games of more than 30,000 fans this season.

It hasn’t gone unnoticed by Mariners manager Scott Servais and the players.

The weather in the early home games was less than ideal and the Mariners weren’t exactly playing an exciting brand of baseball or having much success.

“I will say the support and the turnout we have gotten from our fans, it’s been fantastic here early in the season,” Servais said. “The weather was great all weekend and we had awesome crowds with Mother’s Day and a good vibe in the ballpark. But even early on when the weather hasn’t been great, people have been out supporting us. Our guys feel it.”

The Mariners moving back above .500 after a 6-10 start to the season has helped reignite some excitement.

“The expectation for our team is to be really competitive and be right in the hunt as we go down the stretch,” Servais said. “We’re a long ways from getting there. We’re still trying to figure this thing out here, but we certainly feel the positive support from our fan base and it is greatly appreciated.”

Servais knew the crowds wouldn’t be quite as large for the Royals over the next three days, even mentioning in the team’s “value games” promotions.

“We’ll see how it works out tonight,” he said. “But that’s the way it is. I think we have a good vibe in our ballpark. I think fans are excited to get this thing going.”

The Mariners’ attendance has been on an uptick the past few seasons.