The Mets and Citi Field
 

Wenty to the Mets game at Citi field yesterday - Saturday. A beautiful day. But what I noticed was the results of the Mets pricing policies on seating in the new stadium. They claimed they needed this new stadium so they can have the income from luxury boxes and luxury type seating at field level behind home plate. And they adopted a pricing policy that reaches well into three digits to sit in the choice areas. Guess what? Most of those choice seats were empty - luxury boxes - empty. And you can notice that night after night on TV. We sat - for $35 in Promenade - way out in left field behind the foul pole and pretty high up -- $35! Some action in left field below us was not visible - great seating design! In days past when you went to the ball park you would notice that the better seating got filled up first and the upper reaches of the stadium would only fill up for big games with big crowds. Now - the bulk of the crowd is way up on the top deck - far out in left and right field - the cheap (and they are not cheap) seats. The Mets are insulting their fans - overcharging them for lousy seating and designing the better parts of the ball park for people who would pay 3 digits for a ball game.

All true. But in a couple of years when they aren't the horrible team they are right now, it will sell out and those expensive seats will be full. The team in the Bronx is even more pricey, and they sell those expensive seats. It's all about the product on the field. And the economy doesn't help either. It used to be a cheap day out - it is now totally out of my entertainment budget unless I can snag a freebie. Even then, it's expensive to eat, drink and park.

People have been complaining about Citi Field since it opened. It's really a shame the design is so bad. But I've been to other parks and none are perfect. It's without a doubt a huge step above Shea!!!

The fact that the expensive seats are empty doesn;t mean they aren;t sold. those are typically corporate seats and are used mostly during the week and in better weather to entertain clients. As the team gets better the companies that own the seats will use them more often.

As for seat prices - I equate a major league BB game with a Broadway show ($100 tickets) -not a movie ($12 tickets). On that basis the prices are higher - yes - but not unreasonable.

I agree with nytraveler, and such discussions come up a good bit on sports websites. Folks, it's not 1950 anymore, and a family of four can't get tickets for a ballgame, find parking in a nearby lot, buy a bunch of souvenirs, and stuff themselves with ballpark food, all for $50 or less.

The short version answer involves supply and demand. Like most other business owners, baseball's owners charge as much as they think the market will bear. If the team can't reap the profit margin they seek, they'll inch prices down. The days of the ultra cheap MLB seat is a thing of the past -- and gas isn't 25 cents a gallon either, sorry to say.

One can usually get a much better financial return on a visit to a minor league baseball game, and it's usually just as much fun. If you want a baseball bargain, that's the place to be.

You don't have to go back to the '50's. In the '80's when gas was $1.20, the same as before the second Iraq War, I was able to park in a free spot, get tix in the top 10 rows at Shea for free or $4 (yeah, nosebleed seats but we could always move down), bring snacks and sandwiches and a soda. We went to 90% of the summer home games for two years! Now I go maybe twice a year - just once the last two. With the two new stadiums in NYC, they've cut the number of seats by one million over the course of the season so the prices are unnecessarily sky high. In most other cities they still have some seats for about the price of a movie. (and their team is probably better than the one that plays in Flushing Meadows). Supply, demand and a lot of greed thrown in for good measure.

I have been Mets fan from Day One and a life long Rangers, Knicks, and Giants fan.

A thousand years ago I went to the Ranger and Knick games for 50 cents and $1 through the high school GO. The thought was the same a drug dealer, get 'em when they are young and on the cheap. They cannot even do that today.

Although the Rangers have only won one Stanley Cap in the last 69 years they still sell out. And the prices are astronomical. The Jets have not won a Super Bowl since Joe Willie wore panty hose but they are still asking small fortunes for the rights to seats.

The problem is that people still think you can a seat in the bleachers for 5 bucks and a frank of buck and a half. While other tickets are really absurd people expect baseball tickets to be cheap, not matter how much they pay the players. It is ingrained in the psyche of baseball fans.

It's been 20 years since the '80s -- time flies when you're living life. And prices have gone up since then as well. I don't doubt that Aduchamp1 is right, but sorry to say, people need to be realistic about things no matter how much one might wish otherwise.

A number of responses note that the economy of today is different than yesterday, etc. etc. - thus ball park tickets are much higher. And I understand all that. My point is: ok - if you charge big bucks for those choice seats - why are they empty? And some note that they very well might have been sold - but it's hard to believe that hardly anyone showed up for those paid for seats - and corporate outfits can always find someone to give the tickets to. But even if they are sold (and empty) - how does that look? It's sort of snubbing your nose at the fans - we'll keep these seats empty - and you can sit in our fancily named bleacher seats ( ok - I remember they were 55 cents at Ebbets Field - I know - yesterday). That stadium is really designed for decent viewing from only those triple digit priced seats. -- And it's sort of not comparable to Broadway theater where they accommodate a thousand plus in an audience for very expensively produced shows to a ball park seating 40 - 50 thousand.

There are some other possibilities here:

--the empty non-luxury box seats may be held by season ticket holders who decided not to show up that day. This could be dependent on such things as the time the game was played (maybe on a weekday afternoon), who the opponent was (I can't imagine a mad rush to see a weak team like the Washington Nationals), the weather (could have been cold, drizzly, or some such), or something else. And if such folks, either in these seats or luxury boxes, don't show up for the game, the Mets can't just go and resell them to someone else -- however, the seat or box holders could do so via StubHub or another agency.

--Mets management may not care if some seats are empty as long as an acceptable profit margin is brought in. That's of course their choice, not ours.

bach - Yes - I can understand some of those luxury seats being empty - but I'm talking about 60% or more unoccupied. This was a beautiful day (Saturday) - ideal for baseball, the opponent wss Atlanta - a Mets nemesis and a crowd drawer - so none of your conditions applied to this game.
But here is a way to see baseball and have a great meal: Following the game we walk Roosevelt Ave. into Flushing - headed for Shanghai Tang on 40 Rd - superb Chinese food - as you will find in many places in Flushing although we did not have this - they specialize in a hot pot where you get heaping mounds of food and a hot pot where you cook your own. Many locals come in for this dish. 40 Rd is a sight unto itself - like a street in Hong Kong with all kinds of stuff going on. And it's one block from Main St. station - #7 train. Tourists note: you can't eat like this around Yankee Stadium -- and the train ride out on the #7 to the most multi-ethnic area in the world -- I heard about 4 languages on the train in my immediate vicinity.