Sorry, but I can't get upset at rich people losing their front-row seats.

Ticket prices are going up, but I'm fortunate to be able to see a few games a year. Next year I'll be a little higher up and maybe see fewer games. If I wanted cheap tickets, I'd cheer from the Rays.

Actually...

1 Well, it's wealthy people losing their family's seats to even wealthier people and/or corporations.

I don't think I'll be going to any games in the new digs anytime soon.

I just think it's sad that attending a baseball game in person has gotten to be such an expensive affair. Football, I can kinda understand - after all there's only 8 home games. But christ, there's ten times as many home baseball dates. Share and share alike.

Thankfully, I can still attend a AAA game and enjoy a few beers and peanuts for less than $25.

Wow... I guess I have been living in the wood too long. I took my daughter to Fenway last year, and had to go to a 'scalper' (ticket agency) for good seats. Tickets, food and parking ending up costing me over $250... and I was stunned. Oh well....

Question: If the Yankees were to pull a '1965', and had a few consecutive years of not contending for the PS, will the Yankee still sell 2 or 3 million tickets at these prices? And if you commit to TEN YEARS of seats at $220-85 PER SEAT and the team tanks, is it tough shit on you?

Will the Yankee NEED to be perennial contenders to justify seat prices? Or does gouging people now for 10 year commitments insure tens of million in income regardless of how the Yankees perform?

When I went to my first games in the late 60's, it was rare to have the stadium even half full. Good seats were always available to any game. Is the current tremendous demand based on a winning team... or is going to the stadium simply the 'in thing' for the affluent?

The ten year commitments, along with the steeper prices, I think, are designed to do two things: bring in more revenue and/or pry good seats from families and long-time ticket holders so that they go back on the market (and bring in more revenue).

The YES revenue stream should more than fund the Yankees for years to come. The 2008 Yankees aren't exactly inspiring anyone to make a 10-year commitment, though.

Christ, and I thought $45 for a seat 24 rows up from the visitor's dugout at Wrigley was bad!!

Imagine, I used to go to 15-20 Cardinal games in the early 90's for a $4-$5 bleacher seat and $4 parking....and of course $1.15 gas.

Another reason not to be a Yankee fan I guess...

3 It's the new Broadway for the nouveau riche.

3 The Yanks will get their $$. They drew when they were bad in the 80's & 90's.

Given their financial resources, and their current owner, I say they will never be more than a few years out of contention. Even when they bottomed out in 1990, they were contending as early as 1993. And before 1990, they were contending as late as 1988.

That they'll be raking in the dough @ the new stadium is a bonus.

7 Their attendance didn't completely tank, but it wasn't good in the early 90s - less than 2 million, less than the league average.

I think fans are more savvy now too - even if the yanks go on a 5 year skid and they drop the prices (unlikely, but roll with me), the fans will still gobble up season tix at the lower prices just so they can be in a good position when the team rights the ship. The 90's and early 2000's got lots of people into investing and the whole "buy low/sell high" mindset.

I also can't get worked up about rich people getting the shaft in favor of wealthy people. I prefer those bastards get the shaft, after all I'm never going to be able to sit in the lower deck anyway. Makes no difference to me if it's $100 a seat or a million. I'd prefer a million, then maybe the seats in the nosebleeds will be cheaper, or there's more money for the payroll. Might as well make as much money off them fools as possible. Someone's gotta pay ARod.

My dad knows a guy, rich, but die hard. Had had 8 seats behind home plate since the Stadium was renovated in the 70s.
Last year they were $125 a pop. A cool $81,000 for the season.
This year: $250 each, so he went down to 4 seats, still the same $81K.
He got his application for the new digs: $850 for the same seats. Even for 2 seats, it'd be about 140 G's…
He said see ya in the bleachers.

8 And that only lasted 2 years; 91 & 92. They drew over 2.4M in 1993.

10 The seats in the nosebleeds will be cheaper, or at least the same price (for the first year anyway). Same with the bleachers. The way I see it these "premium" seats are going to subsidize the cheaper seats, allowing them to keep those prices down. Or at least I hope that's the plan.

Maybe we should wait until pricing for the rest of the seats in the Stadium comes out before getting too worked up over it.

I'm making a trip up to NYC in August, and me and 15 buddies are catching the Yankees/Royals on Saturday afternoon. Tix are sold out except for StubHub/eBay/other scalpers. StubHub seems reputable, but we're paying $50 a pop for $13 bleacher seats. And that was a relatively great deal. As far as I can tell, StubHub's entire existence is to drive up attendance numbers and prices. The ballclub says, "We've got $13 tickets so your family can come to the game", but there aren't actually any $13 tickets, nosebleed or anywhere. MLB would have screamed for scalpers selling $13 tix for $50 to get locked up for life, until StubHub came along and MLB gets their cut. Now it's "reselling" not "scalping". Tell that to Joe NYC who's dropping $200 to get his family in the door. I'm not even bringing concessions or parking into the argument.

After all that, though, I'm still going to the game, so I guess, "Way to go, Yankee businessmen."