Yanks (Officially) Reduce Ticket Prices For 2010

A quick bit of news before we get to last night's rumble.

Odds are, you won't be seeing too many pictures like this when next season rolls around. Darren Rovell of CNBC got his hands on the pricing list the Yankees are about to distribute to season ticket holders in a couple of days and here's the main takeaway:

CNBC has exclusively obtained the 2010 ticket price list that the Yankees will send out to its season ticket holders in the coming days and prices for more than 80 percent of the stadium will remain the same.

Some of the highest price seats will see reductions of up to 40 percent, including those in the Legends area and the Delta Sky 360 Suite.

The 80% of the Stadium that will remain the same are obviously the affordable areas like the bleachers, upper deck and second level. Which is understandable, because demand exceeded supply for those seats already. But hey, at least they aren't increasing them.

Rovell later adds that the Yankees, despite all the backlash and bad press surrounding the New Stadium, still lead the Majors in attendance.

Regardless, it was pretty obvious the Yankees had to do something about the prices for the suites, but the outstanding question was what they were going to do with the contracts that people had purchased extending into 2010 and beyond. Those who have made long term commitments for the newly-reduced suites will only be on the hook for the lower prices the Yankees announce in a couple of days. The most expensive Legends tickets are $1500 instead of $2500, which is a huge drop percentage-wise, but still pretty outrageous.

For the vast majority of fans the most relevant effect of the reduction in prices is that the seats is that there will be fewer of the empty seats that we saw early last season. Whether dropping the price to $1500 will fill out all the vacant spots is up for debate, but I'm guessing it won't.

Yanks Slash Prices On Most Expensive Seats For Playoffs

On Monday the Yankees send out a press release announcing their ticket prices for the postseason. It garnered a good amount of positive press based on the fact that the prices are going to be lower than they were in 2007, which is fairly remarkable considering that took place across the street at the Old Stadium.

Without getting into specifics, almost all of the prices for the ALDS are equivalent to the regular season norms, and it escalates from there as it gets deeper into October.

Well it's nice that the Yankees have made their ticket prices for the playoffs more affordable, although you could probably argue that since they haven't registered a sellout since Opening Day, it might be more of a necessity than a courtesy. But when the playoffs roll around guess who gets the real break... the people with the most expensive seats. From the press release (emphasis and numbering mine):

Regular season ticket prices for full-season ticket licensees (non-Suites) will be replicated for the 2009 American League Division Series (i.e., a Main Level ticket that costs a full season ticket licensee $60 in the 2009 regular season will cost the same licensee $60 for the ALDS), (1) however, full-season ticket licensees (non-Suites) of $325 Field Level seats may purchase their seats for the ALDS at the lower price of $275 each.

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(2) Full-season Suite licensees in the Legends Suite, Delta Sky360 Suite and Jim Beam Suite, have all already paid their Suite license fees. Accordingly, they will only be required to purchase their Suite tickets, which will range from $65-$275 per Suite ticket for the ALDS, $115-$350 per Suite ticket for the ALCS, and $150-$425 per Suite ticket for the World Series.

What that boils down to is that (1) the very best non-Legends seats are going to be less expensive for the people with the seat licenses and (2) the (mainly corporate) Suite ticket holders don't have to pay their license fee at all.

Now, considering the fact that the first bunch paid $325 for their seats all year, it doesn't make a ton of sense to suddenly drop the price for by far the most desirable games of the season. I guess that's the Yankees' way of throwing them a bone after ripping them off all this time.

As for the Legends and other Suites, their license fees make up a giant portion of the ticket price. For instance, the seats I sat in back in June had a $250 seat license and just a $150 face value, meaning that they would only cost the latter amount for the ALDS. (The ~$100 food and beverage fee would still apply, but that's optional).

We've discussed the concept and execution of the Legends Seats multiple times here and an underlying theme throughout those posts was a distaste for the way that the Yankees have bent over backwards to cater to the their richest customers, while taking for granted their core fans.

This would seem to be another example of that, but the upshot is that it's highly unlikely the seats that so often sat unoccupied early in the year will be similarly vacant when October rolls around. Furthermore, if the Yanks sell out all their seats, it might trigger the release of the supposed standing room only seats which would make playoff tickets easier to come by for non-season ticket holders. In that scenario, everyone wins.

Another intersting offshoot (for me at least) is whether or not the Yanks will lower the prices for the Legends seats next year. It would be tough to do because some of the companies signed multi-year contracts at the original prices. Something to keep an eye on this offseason...

(Full disclosure: This post in the NYT Bats Blog noticed the same policy in the press release and came to some of the same conclusions, but I had this post written before that one was published. I didn't really feel the need to go back and retroactively insert it into my post.)

Here's The Difference

I'm a little late to the party on this one, but it's never the wrong time to rip Lonn Trost. Very quickly... Yesterday as the Yankees were revealing their absurd - I mean, completely reasonable, free market - Old Stadium memorabilia prices, Lonn Trost was asked about the New Stadium's policy, which does not allow fans from other sections to come down to the Field Level to watch batting practice up close. He had this to say:

Well, if you purchase a suite, do you want somebody in your suite? If you purchase a home, do you want somebody in your home?

Here's the difference, Lonn. Seats at a stadium aren't a home. People can't go there when the Stadium is closed. Purchasing those seats allow for people to sit in them for before, during and after home games. It's a "suite" only because you call it that. Nowhere else is in the world are padded plastic seats without a roof considered a "suite". Actual suites are in hotels and on cruise ships and chalets in the Swiss Alps. The New Stadium is an outdoor sporting event venue, not a vacation destination. 

And as PeteAbe has brought up, those seats are almost always empty in the hours leading up to games. If fans from other sections were watching BP from down there and a ticket holder politely informed them that they were in their spot, I'm sure they would move out of the way. Apparently the obscene ticket prices at the New Stadium have spared the wealthy the indignity of interacting with us commoners for even the briefest of moments. Which would be fine, but again, those tickets still aren't totally sold. The Yankees are still screwing their real fans in the name of their make-believe dream customers. 

The Great Divide(rs)

I didn't take a picture, because that would be weird, but I found out something about the New Yankee Stadium during our descent into Section 112 that really pissed me off (pun intended... wait for it). There are dividers between the urinals on the Field Level, but not anywhere else in the Stadium.

Is it a huge deal? Of course not, but could there be a better symbol of how much the Yankees have bent over backwards to cater to the wealthiest customers and how they could care less about the core fans? By installing the dividers at the field level, they are acknowledging that it matters, but only providing the "luxury" to those purchasing the most expensive seats. It's an issue of simple human decency, and they can't possibly cost that much to put them in.

Have you ever had a friend who desperately tried to date someone who was out of their league while ignoring a person who was legitimately interested in them? The object of their affection was strikingly attractive, but even if they gave them the time of day, it was just to be nice. The second option wasn't as good-looking, but they had actual feelings for your friend and probably would have done anything to be with them. Guess what, Yankees, the corporate guy, who you want to sit in the insanely expensive seats... he's just not that into you.

Forgive the sweeping generalization, but most of the people who could afford the highest priced seats at the New Stadium are not real fans. Here is why: If you have a job that allows you to spend anywhere from $100K to $800K on two Yankees season tickets, you aren't going to have much time in the day to read blogs or listen to sports talk radio. Wealthy folks also go out to dinner pretty often. When do they do that? Probably in the neighborhood of 7-10 at night, give or take, and three or four star restaurants aren't going to have the game on TV. The more money you have, the more options you have, and everywhere you look in this city, companies are bending over backwards to cater to what remains of the uber-rich. The Yankees are just one option; an option that's not in Manhattan and requires an commitment of 81 games and a small fortune.

The people (and corporations) who buy those seats are never going to love the Yankees as much as the average fan, and the direction of the economy has blatantly exposed that. There are still some who could absorb the price increase in the new building, but for them it was a luxury. You can tell by the outrage and disenfranchisement of the people who were displaced from their affordable full or even partial season ticket packages that they thought of it as a necessity.

It's clear that it doesn't make sense to alienate the average fan in the name of the casual but much wealthier fan from a loyalty standpoint. Given the state of the nation's finances right now it doesn't makes sense in the general ledger either. Did it ever? Ben K. from River Ave. Blues doesn't think so.

All you need to know: While the Yankees put art galleries alongside concession stands on the Field Level, Freddy Sez gets shut out of the Stadium. (h/t Jorge Says No)

Margaritis, People Who No Longer Exist & The Boat Basin

Today, Large William Steeze, the Frank-a-nation and myself will be making the journey to the New Stadium to see if Chien Ming Wang can make it through the third inning. If it was last year, this would be only one of 13 Saturdays and just one step along the path to rid the Earth of the horrible affliction known as "Margaritis".

(For those unfamiliar, Margaritis is a chorinic infirmity that occurs only in warm weather and is characterized by extreme sobriety. The only cure is Margaritas.)

The reality of getting shut out of the Saturday package is just starting to set in. We only had it for two years, so we have no right to be all up in arms about not being able to renew it. Our friend Nick sat in the same seats everyday for seven years and got cast aside also.

I love the New Stadium and I understand the implications of he price increases. There are fewer seats to begin with, even before you get into the effects of the "relocation". The people who were in the most expensive seats got bumped back, thereby displacing those further back in the field level, which echoed through the mezzanine, into the upper deck, and eventually trickled down to half season packages, 40 & 20 game plans, and at the bottom of the food chain to the poor schlubs like us with weekend deals.

It would be a lot easier to swallow if we didn't have to look at pictures like this, and this, and this, and this, and this, reminding us of the fact that we got fucked for the sake of people who no longer exist. I don't care what Randy Levine says, behind closed doors there is some serious handwringing going on. Over a month ago, we pointed out the fact that the Yankees were getting desperate and saw the writing on the wall.

It's too late now. The Structure That Mariano Rivera Erected has been completed and the prices have been set. Some people (er, corporations) have already bought packages at full prices and I highly doubt that the Yankees are going to piss off their best customers by selling the seats directly next to them at a discount. The bottom line is that, for pretty much every game that doesn't feature the Mets or Red Sox, there are going to be a ton of people like us Fackfaces watching on YES while many of the best seats in the house sit unoccupied.

Hey, there's always next year, right?

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In other, happier news, it's fucking beautiful outside.

Every year, when the weather starts getting nice, people who live above the Tropic of Cancer (or below the Tropic of Capricorn) start asking themselves the same question: "Why do I live in a place where there is Winter, again?" We forget, but once the mercury passes the 60 degree mark, life becomes a whole lot sweeter.

Exhibit A, captured last night:

Oh, the Boat Basin. What would summer on the West Side be without you?

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That's all for now folks. Although I just figured out how to post from my iPhone, so there may or may be some drunken dispatches from Section 416 once game time rolls around.

In the meantime, get out and get some fresh air:

You Can't Get There From Here

Ross at New Stadium Insider drums up another detail in the fine print about the New Stadium: Only those with Field Level tickets will have access to the Field Level area and concessions:

We have mentioned before that one of the most enjoyable aspects of going to baseball games is roaming around the stadium and checking out all of the nooks and crannies of the ballpark. Never before have we been to a ballpark that does not let fans explore the concessions on an entire level of the Stadium. We have been to Camden Yards in Baltimore, Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia and Safeco Field in Seattle in the past few years and NONE of those stadiums have this policy.

I'm hoping there aren't any concession stands that are located only on the Field Level, so everyone would have access to everything they wanted to try, but if not, that's the Yankees' loss more than ours.

A lot of the people at the Field Level have the option of having food brought to their seats. Why do can't us commoners come check out the food options and walk around? It's not like people can get down to where the seats are. They are still advertising the availability of "Between the Bases" seats during Spring Training games and elsewhere. The Yankees continue to cater to the endangered species that is "Corporate High Rollers" while telling the average fan where they can stick their New Stadium experience.

Tucked away at the bottom of the Yanks initial press release was the fact that gates would be three hours prior to game time, so fans would presumably be able to take in some batting practice. Ross shoots that one down too. He finds here that "Guests are welcome to watch batting practice from their seat location".

Yup, hurry to the park three hours early so you can sit in your 400 level seats during batting practice and get a head start on getting ripped off on concessions. You wouldn't want to disturb those people in the Field Level, who aren't even going to be there yet.

Or you could just go to Stan's, Billy's, or the Bowling Alley. Your choice.