Redskins in bed with ticket scalpers?

[Schneed10]

Originally Posted by firstdown

From what a gather this is a way for the team to give permision for individuals to sell their tickets to games that they are not going to use. We see a form of that going on here when someone has an extra ticket or two. If your a scalper, corporation, individual ( selling large number of tickets) they are still going after you for scalping. The individual ticket sales is going on all the time but now the team can make a profitt from the sale. I don't realy see how anything has changed. Now if they let individuals sell there season tickets season after season and they allow this to go on then I have a problem with this because they are in it only for profitt, thus their a scalper.

I don't have a problem with any of this. Tickets cost so damn much because there are tons of fans willing to pay that much. Simple supply and demand. If a season ticket holder wants to resell his tickets every year at a higher price, I say let him. As long as someone is willing to pay the price, it's a fair deal in my eyes.

If you want to attend games at face value, you can always:

1) Buy season tickets and go to the games.
2) Buy season tickets and sell the ones you don't want.
3) Try to rely on scrounging for the few tickets remaining and buy them at face value.

But if #3 doesn't work out for you, I have no sympathy. As far as I'm concerned, if you want seats, get your ass on the waiting list and get season tickets. Otherwise, pay the scalping premium and stop whining or watch the Skins on TV like I do.

I HATE ticket price complaints.

[MTK]

I understand the simplicity of supply and demand.

Maybe it's just the hippie in me, but just because the Skins and sports teams in general can charge such high prices, does it make it right?

The common man has been left behind in all of this. There's no way a family of four can afford to go to a ball game on consistent basis anymore.

I guess that's just the corporatization of America at work. We can debate something like this into the ground if we want to. Sorry to get off topic it just ticks me off to see the rich getting even more rich.

[TheMalcolmConnection]

Yeah, I was going to post something about the haves and have-nots. I mean there are people who are just as deserving to go as the rich.

[724Skinsfan]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

There's no way a family of four can afford to go to a ball game on consistent basis anymore.

You said it. Now to take a family to a professional sporting event cost nearly as much as going on a vacation. Family of four from out of town: at least $500 if you go cheap. Closer to $1,000 if you're trying to be comfortable.

[Schneed10]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

I understand the simplicity of supply and demand.

Maybe it's just the hippie in me, but just because the Skins and sports teams in general can charge such high prices, does it make it right?

The common man has been left behind in all of this. There's no way a family of four can afford to go to a ball game on consistent basis anymore.

I guess that's just the corporatization of America at work. We can debate something like this into the ground if we want to. Sorry to get off topic it just ticks me off to see the rich getting even more rich.

Yeah I can see us going down a political road on this one, because there is no hippie side of the Schneed, and while I'm pretty politically moderate, I tend to lean very right wing when it comes to free markets. And that argument would just perpetuate itself and get dumb.

I will say that a part of me laments the fact that tickets are getting so expensive. The end result is that the fans who can afford to go are more often the corporate types who attend under their best behavior. If you want a good 12th man, you have to be willing to AT LEAST be loud and obnoxious, and AT BEST be downright venomous and evil. And with corporate types taking up all the seats, I think that's a pretty significant cause of the recent decline in the Skins' homefield advantage. At RFK, the average fan could afford to go, and the average fan was passionate. And the average fan made that place downright scary - it was the average fan that was shaking the bleachers. FedEx will have a hard time regaining that as long as ticket prices keep going up. Winning helps the homefield advantage, but some more average joes like us would help too.

But my concern over the situation is completely limited to the negative impact on the team's homefield advantage. I could care less if people are whining because they can't afford it or whatever. That's just life in my eyes. But I'll leave the political leanings out of it.

[Hail2theskins]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

Maybe it's just the hippie in me, but just because the Skins and sports teams in general can charge such high prices, does it make it right?

i agree with you completley, I dont think professional sports should be treated like business because pro sports got started in the first place because people found this amazing thing that could be done on the weekends away from their business lives, something to get your mind off the workweek, and i understand that debts need to be paid and so do the players but i also think it comes down to the ridiculous amount of money we pay our professional athletes/actor/actress types

[TheMalcolmConnection]

You could argue that this isn't even paying them, the ticket brokers are also regular Joes trying to get by in this world just like you and me.

[Schneed10]

Originally Posted by Hail2theskins

i agree with you completley, I dont think professional sports should be treated like business because pro sports got started in the first place because people found this amazing thing that could be done on the weekends away from their business lives, something to get your mind off the workweek, and i understand that debts need to be paid and so do the players but i also think it comes down to the ridiculous amount of money we pay our professional athletes/actor/actress types

Seems like a pleasant picture you have painted in your head about what professional sports should be like. Unfortunately it's not grounded in anything remotely resembling reality.

It's a business, like it or not. Players cost money, putting it on TV costs money, building nice stadiums costs money, serving concessions costs money, I could go on and on.

If you like football free of impact from big business, go check out some high school football games. But if you like the NFL, deal with reality. We pay our athletes/actor/actress types so much money because there are so many of us who are willing to pay dearly to see them. That's life.

[irish]

And keep in mind that these outrageous redskin ticket prices are for a team that has not won squat in a long time. Image what will happen to ticket prices if they get good.

Sports teams in general better watch because there will be an upper limit on what fans will pay. These season ticket packages have automatic escalation written into the contract and fans must sign up for multi year deals so the price just keeps going up. I heard in sportstalk 980 today fans calling in about redskin season tix and one guy said he has 7 club level seats, this is the last year of his contract, the redskins want him to sign a 10 year deal which at the end will have his seats costing somewhere in the neighborhood of $30,000 for the season. He told the redskins no thanks.

[TheMalcolmConnection]

I think we can separate the team from the scalping prices though. I have no problem paying the face value of a ticket. It's just a pain-in-the-ass when I have to find one on eBay or a ticket broker and pay three to four times the price. But like I said above, they're the same "average joe" as we are, trying to make it by.

I still think they could find a more respectable way to make a living.

[irish]

Originally Posted by Schneed10

Seems like a pleasant picture you have painted in your head about what professional sports should be like. Unfortunately it's not grounded in anything remotely resembling reality.

It's a business, like it or not. Players cost money, putting it on TV costs money, building nice stadiums costs money, serving concessions costs money, I could go on and on.

If you like football free of impact from big business, go check out some high school football games. But if you like the NFL, deal with reality. We pay our athletes/actor/actress types so much money because there are so many of us who are willing to pay dearly to see them. That's life.

TV networks pay the NFL to put it on so that does not cost the team anything. Same with concessions. As for stadiums they cost the taxpayer money, not the teams.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by Schneed10

Seems like a pleasant picture you have painted in your head about what professional sports should be like. Unfortunately it's not grounded in anything remotely resembling reality.

It's a business, like it or not. Players cost money, putting it on TV costs money, building nice stadiums costs money, serving concessions costs money, I could go on and on.

If you like football free of impact from big business, go check out some high school football games. But if you like the NFL, deal with reality. We pay our athletes/actor/actress types so much money because there are so many of us who are willing to pay dearly to see them. That's life.

That is life, unfortunate as it may be.

[firstdown]

I do have a problem with scalpers. They get lucky and get season tickets even though they care nothing about the game. Then they turn around and sell them to the fans (who the tickets where originaly ment for) and sell them at a hugh markup. If a fan buys season tickets and wants to sell a few because of cost I'm fine with that. With the Redskins scalping is a bigger problem than most teams because all of our games are sold out.

[TheMalcolmConnection]

Just to play devil's advocate: Say you had access to a very popular sport's team's tickets and you could make five to six times the profit, would you do it then?

I honestly can't say that I would have the morals to resist.

[MTK]

I sell concert tickets a few times per year. My wife and I are in the fan club for Dave Matthews and we both order tickets, use the best ones, and sell the leftovers. We always sell them for face. Call me a sucker, but I just wouldn't feel right ripping off my fellow DMB fan. Plus if you get caught you'll get booted from the fan club and lose your shot at great seats. Even if that wasn't the case, I would still sell them for face value. That's just me though. Yeah I probably lose out one some good loot but I just wouldn't feel right charging a ridiculous price for a $50 ticket.