How is that hockey news? I mean, technically, it's not. And this whole post might not make sense. Just warning you...
But say a family of four wants to go to a Rangers game and they live on Long Island. That's $14 x 4 for the round-trip train tickets. Tickets are, conservatively, $50 each. Already, we're at $256, and that's just getting there. Everyone gets a hot dog outside of The Garden. Dad is a big fella, so he gets two. $10. Four Hawaiian Punches, $4. Inside, a flag ($15) to commemorate Little Steve's first game, and a picture of Henrik Lundqvist ($12) because Julia wants something too. A few slices of New York's biggest (not best) pizza at Penn Station, and we're reaching $320 for a night out. That's very conservative as well.
And going to a Ranger or Islander game is the cheapest of the sporting events. What's parking at Shea and Yankee Stadiums, $30? That makes the $8 beers look better in comparison. If you want to go to a Jets or Giants game, be prepared to spend $50 in gas sitting in traffic into New Jersey, then get gouged on parking, hot dogs, replica jerseys, and cheese hats that have nothing to do with New York.
Put simply, the owners of these teams do not care about you, the slumping economy, or making an enjoyable evening affordable. The players don't care either, which kills me. Why should I root for Alex Rodriguez if I know that my seats near third base are so expensive because he demands $27M a year to hit a ball (into a double play).
The NHL instituted a Salary Cap in 2005. That year, the Cap was around $44M. This year, the MINIMUM of the Cap is higher than the MAXIMUM was then. That's great news, the NHL is making more money, more people are watching the games on TV and going in person. The game is doing good and won't fold.
The reason that they raise the floor is so the owners won't keep all of the revenue. They are forced to put it back into the team, in the way of players salaries, as negotiated by the NHLPA.
Instead of raising the floor so the owners don't keep all the money (see: Milwaukee Brewers of the early 2000s and the current Pittsburgh Pirates), why not put the money back where it came from? The fans. Don't raise ticket prices after every 2nd round knockout. Don't charge $5 for a 16 ounce bottle of Jana water that cost 26 cents to get. Wouldn't it be something if a team lowered ticket prices?
Attendance will suffer this year. I might be wrong if a lot of tickets are already purchased, whether they be through a package like me, or a corporation who bought up season tickets. However, if things don't improve, things will get bad next year. So bad, that the Islanders might not sell 10,000 tickets per game, and Nashville will not hit their self-imposed minimum of 14,000. Corporate sponsors with ticket commitments for this year might drop out before 2009-10, leaving the owners with a choice. Stay in Nashville and lose money, or move, rent-free, to a state-of-the-art arena in Kansas City.
Seriously, would Free Food Night, 75 Cent Popcorn Night, or lower ticket prices all year be a bad thing for a lot of franchises? I know the Rangers would never make ticket prices lower. It's the nature of the beast. A huge city, a rabid fan base, and corporate sponsors who buy the lower bowl of tickets unite to sell out every single home game. However, they gave free food away for the last game of the Knicks season last year, and in 2004 they had Retro Price Night on popcorn and cotton candy for an Original Six matchup against the Bruins that I went to. Would it kill them to offer Dollar Hot Dogs or free soda for a few games early in the year?
I'm a realist. I know that James "Daddy Made Me Rich" Dolan will probably not do this. However, what about Charles Wang? Personally, I've said for a few years that the Islanders should make tickets $5-$10 for unsold ones before games. The game will be played regardless of who is in the building. Why not get more people in there and spending money? If the ticket cost me ten bucks, I'd be more willing to shell out $5 for a pretzel twist or $25 for an Okposo t-shirt.
I don't know where I'm going with this. When I was doing my pretend "I'm a GM and I'm giving away half-priced tickets all year" speech in the mirror as I was washing my hands after a post-Mexican dinner deuce, this sounded a lot better.
But do you see where I'm going? Most owners don't care about us. It's not really the players' faults, as they just get what they can. I would too if I was one. Get what you can, while you can, especially in this day and age. But that's what screws us, the middle-class fans who can now only afford 2 games a year because gas is $3.89 a gallon and Chris Drury gets paid $121,000 for every point he had last year.
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In an effort to boost the economy, I bought XBox 360 and NHL 09 yesterday. Solid game, although I don't love the Be a Pro mode like my counterpart Bryan does. I'm a Dynasty guy, myself.
The $2500 luxury boxes pay Alex Rodriguez's salary.
ReplyDeleteYour seats near third base pay Derek Jeter's salary so don't root for him when he demands $21M a year to hit a ball (into a double play).
On the last "Real Sports", they did a fascinating piece on personal seat licenses. They had this financial expert on there who said the reason that the sports leagues are all signing deals with StubHub isn't to help the fans. It's also not so they can get a cut of the action. The real reason is so that the leagues can get all the data from StubHub - how much fans are paying for tickets, how much more fans pay for big games, so on and so forth - so they can jack the prices up as high as possible without people getting too upset. He also suggested that the fans have made this bed of obscene devotion and now they have to sleep in it, which sounds harsh but is totally true. No matter how high prices go, someone will be willing to pay. How else do you explain someone paying $25,000 just for the right to watch the Jets play eight crappy games a year?
ReplyDeleteThe age of sports as the affordable, populist entertainment for blue-collar Americans has been over for a long time Zach. An Eastern Conference team will probably be forced to move to Las Vegas at the end of this year. Quite frankly, I would cry if it happened to my beloved Islanders, but let's be realistic: it probably should. The Islanders haven't been able to sellout games since I was 3 and Pat LaFontaine and the word concussion hadn't yet been used in the same sentence. It's a sad, depressing thing to think about. But it's like this:
ReplyDeleteThe American economy is in the shits.
Professional sports are an international business primarily based in America, hence their need for profits will increase exponentially as the dollar decreases.
Forget about the Canadian dollar for a bit here.
Sports didn't used to be the cash cow they have become. There's a reason Wrigley Field barely has capacity for 42,000. It didn't need to be that big to begin with. Maybe the future of small market teams in an enterprise like the NHL is arenas that seat 10-11K, instead of 15K+.
I do agree about Islanders tickets needing to be $5-$10 on game day. But think about how much money they'd lose on advance tickets if that was the case.
Long Island deserves a professional sports franchise. I blame all you Island-based Rangers fans for that.
What about the Nets? If the Lighthouse goes through, maybe they come back to Uniondale?
Getting back to topic, that was a great post Zachy-boy. Wish you and Bryan the best.
-Lev
Sooo...if Rangers tickets were $20/each your scenario would have, conservatively, the family of four spending $200.
ReplyDelete