Update -
Yesterday on WFAN's Miked Up, Mets Executive Vice President of Business Operations David Howard was interviewed by Mike Francesa. In the interview, Howard admitted that although season tickets are selling better this year than last, they have not sold as many complete season ticket packages as they had expected. About 200 seats were still available for opening day and were being held for season ticket packages not yet purchased.
In an effort to stimulate sales and to sell out opening day, the Mets decided to create a new package offering left over opening day tickets with four additional games from April and May. The pack is called the Opening Day Pack and gives the buyer the choice of games to pick from during the first two months of the season.
Howard pointed out that the cost of many of the 15 game packages are less than the five pack being offered. His remarks were in response to fans who were angered over having to purchase the 15 games to get opening day tickets only to see a five game pack released at this late date. Another point Howard made was that with the 15 game pack, the games are spread accross the entire season and not just in April and May.
Howard is correct. There are 15 game packs remaining whose ticket prices are lower than the five packs being offered. In fact, some of the 15 packs remaining appear so affordable, I'm considering one myself.
Original Post - March 26
Just when you thought you were shut out of opening day, low and behold you can go to the Mets home opener at Citi Field after all.
Back in the winter you could have obtained opening day tickets by purchasing some sort of season ticket plan. There was the full 81 game plan, two forty game plans, and several different 15 game plans, some that included opening day. Then the Mets held a lottery and selected a number of lucky applicants that received the opportunity to buy tickets to the home opener. When single game tickets went on sale, I checked and the Mets website showed me that indeed the home opener was sold out.
Yesterday, the Mets announced that additional opening day seats are available and they can be had by simply buying an additional four games. The four games must be selected from games in April and May. Just for the heck of it, I went on to the Mets web site to see what is available.
On the ticket page, the Citi Field Opener pack is laid out nicely. You can choose seats in the Metropolitan Box, Field Box (both on the field level) or Caesars Club Bronze (second level). Being not of much funds, I plugged in two seats for the Caesars Club Bronze, the cheaper of the three choices. I also picked games featuring the weaker clubs to drive down the price as much as possible. In other words, I did not select games against the Phillies or Braves as much as I would rather see those teams than the Nationals or the Marlins.
When all was said and done, the cost of my two tickets for five games was $950.00. That's almost a thousand dollars for five games, two hundred dollars per game, one hundred a seat. Selecting the Phillies and Braves for the additional four games raises the price over an additional 200 dollars. I'm not saying the price is not reasonable, it's just not reasonable for me. I would guess not for a lot of other people either. You may think I'm not a die hard fan. I would say that is not true. I, like a lot of other people in this bail out economy, am simply not in the position to pay that kind of money for five games which does not include travel, parking, and concession costs. And if you think I am bashing the Mets, I am not.
The Mets are also feeling the pinch of this economy. They are simply trying to stimulate ticket sales by offering the home opener as an incentive. The point of all this is the Mets are moving into a state of the art, brand spanking new ballpark, having not sold out opening day. That has more to do with the economy than the last two failed Septembers do.
It is very likely that once opening day passes, each game of relative insignificance will be played before a number of empty seats. If you have not noticed, the economy is still bad even though the incentive plans put forth by Obama and the congress are starting to show some positive effects. However, major economists on both sides of the aisle agree that the recovery will be slow and expect it to take a year or perhaps even longer. Given these facts, new park or not, I can't see every Mets game will be a sell out.
And it's not just the Mets. Boston Red Sox tickets are available for certain games. This is historic considering the Red Sox have sold out every game now for a number of years. The Red Sox fans have not grown tired of their team and Boston is still expected to content for another championship. Therefore if Sox tickets can be purchased, you know the economy has something to do with it.
If you happen to think the Mets are out of control with their more expensive tickets ($495 per game), get a load of this.
A friend of mine, a Yankee fan, loves to take his family of five to a game on the Fourth of July. I watched him enter ticket information for the game against Toronto. He made the mistake of selecting best seats available. When the five available tickets came up, we could not believe our eyes. The cost of one game for five came out to be $13,423.50, $2600 per seat plus service charges. That's college tuition for a semester at some colleges. Who in their right mind would pay such an outlandish price for a single baseball game?
Those seats are the most expensive the Yankees have to offer. So the fact they came up suggests no one is buying them. With corporations being looked at with a scrupulous eye, don't expect too many CFOs to approve corporate tickets. Not at those prices.
We may be witnessing the pendulum beginning to swing back the other way. The most expensive seats at the two new ballparks are not selling because the economy is so bad. That means less revenue which will translate into less money being offered to players. At some point, the bubble has to burst. Whether that is happening now or not still remains to be seen but make no mistake, the pin has been pushed into the bubble.
