WOULD RATHER BE IN CLEARWATER
Ticket prices for tonight's Game 5 in Los Angeles, in general, have nose-dived. Sort of like the Dodgers bullpen on Monday night.
What StubHub is terming a fire sale is under way out on the West Coast at this hour, as around 2,600 tickets remain and are selling for as low as $8. The average price for a ticket to tonight's game has fallen to $89, and that figure is expected to drop as more of those tickets sell for $10 and $20.
Sean Pate of StubHub wrote in an e-mail a few minutes ago that in his experience he's only seen the situation repeated once before: Last year for the Rockies-Diamondbacks series in Phoenix.
"[That series] saw some similar apathy for pricing," he wrote, "but that’s the only other one that’s in the ballpark. I would expect that from the [fans there], who aren’t [as] loyal or devout, but the Dodgers' prices have really surprised me. This is a market that routinely shells out hundreds per ticket to see USC and the Lakers, but baseball just isn’t driving high prices this year."
The same is happening up north in Boston, although not quite to the same extreme. Pate said they are seeing the lowest tickets for a Boston postseason game in a generation, with tickets going for as low as $65 for standing room at Fenway Park tomorrow night. Where the average price for last year's ALCS games vs. the Indians at Fenway was $448, that price for Game 5 tomorrow is $225 and dropping. Pate said some of it is just a market that's seen its share of postseason games and success, from the Red Sox to the Patriots to the 2007-08 champion Celtics. "So it's no surprise that it's come down a bit."
As has been reported through the week, those average prices for potential NLCS and World Series games at Citizens Bank Park have been hovering, awaiting the results of tonight's game. The average price for Game 6 is $253, but Pate said that figure likely would rise tomorrow as the demand picks up for what would be a possible clinching game. About 1,700 tickets remain. Average prices for Game 7 are $241, and those are expected to take a pretty big jump Saturday for the same reason.
The average price to see the Phillies in the World Series on Saturday, Oct. 25, through Monday, Oct. 27, is $873, according to StubHub. In care you are curious, that figure for the four potential games at Tropicana Field is $587.
"I don't see the opponent having much to do with it," he said. "Even if it's Tampa, Phillies fans don't care. They just want to be there."
A look also at ticketnetwork.com shows tickets for Game 3 on Oct. 25th range from $491 for standing room to $4855 apiece for three seats in Section 120.
Paul Vigna still has the seat he wrestled out of the concrete at Connie Mack Stadium parked in the finished basement, a 1980 Phillies championship mirror hanging above it. Now, why he’s kept an autograph of former Flyer Bruce Gamble on a sheet of Hockey Hall of Fame paper is another story. A native of Philly who grew up in Lansdale, he’s an assistant sports editor at the Daily News in charge of special projects who has written two columns related to sports and consumers: View From the Seats and Savvy Consumer.
ABOUT THIS BLOG:
Athletic contests were, for a long time, simply fun and games. Nowadays they’re just a small part of a sports entertainment industry that puts billions of dollars into play and a number of issues into motion. Moneyball indeed. You might be closer to the action than ever before, but that privilege comes at a price - and often it’s beyond what you can afford.
With that as the backdrop we’ll use this blog to dig out stories and swap advice about how the fan experience is changing and what it’s costing you now and in the future. Some of it will educate, some will let you vent. And in a sports panel format, it should allow for a consensus of opinion that can carry some weight.
