Saturday, December 15, 2007

THE 2008 TICKETING SEASON HAS BEGUN.

I grabbed the mail out of the mailbox as TBF and I were running out to Long Island for Christmas shopping. As he is heading for the LIE, I sort through it: “Bill...junk...wrong address...R.E.M. fan club newsletter… hey, you got your invoice from the Mets!” I rip it open and start reading, and TBF does the same at the next stoplight.

At some point I grabbed everything and put it in the back seat so we didn’t have an accident from a) trying to read while driving and b) getting pissed at the Mets for ripping fans off after the disaster known as the 2007 season.

1) PREMIUM GAMES: Opening Day (which is a Tuesday this year, so thankfully, you will all be spared that drama again), Subway Series, and The Last Game At Shea.
1a) Season and plan holders are entitled to participate in the presale for single game tickets, but, once again, Opening Day and The Last Game are NOT included.

[William from Row F wrote me a while ago, wanting to know what I thought about The Last Game, because his father (aka “the old guy who comes to the games with us") was at the first game at Shea, and his sons would like to make sure he was at the last game. The Mets, of course, sent him the email equivalent of a form letter that basically told him nothing, and, in fact, probably lied, because they said they didn’t know what they were going to do about The Last Game. To that, I say BULLPUCKY.]

2) PRICES APPEAR TO HAVE GONE UP.  No, you aren’t reading that wrong. The business geniuses behind the Mets have decided that although the team completely crashed and burned last season, and this season has not produced any miracles (nor will it - I [heart] Johan Santana probably more than your average Mets fan but we’re not getting him this year)—AND Citifield tickets will require a mortgage on one’s first born - BUT LET’S RAISE 2008 TICKET PRICES!!!!!!! No one will mind! Everyone will consider it fair value for money!

TBF ran the numbers based on his Saturday plan invoice and here’s what we figure seats are going to be.

Platinum - 2007: $35 2008: $41
Gold - 2007: $31 2008: $37
Silver - 2007: $29 2008: $35
Bronze - 2007: $27 2008: $33
Value - 2007 : $21 2008: ??

Again, these are guesstimates based on TBF’s Saturday plan renewal. He could be off somewhere. If you have other data, please share.

3) THERE ARE LESS GAMES IN THE MORE INEXPENSIVE CATEGORIES. Well, I guess that one goes without saying.

YOU ARE RAISING PRICES FOR 2008? ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?

We’ve been saying this since the end of the season: no one expects you to lower prices, but an INCREASE after that year??? What, exactly, is our additional sum of money going for? No, seriously. They’re not going to improve ANYTHING about Shea this year. The broken seats will stay broken, the flooded bathrooms will stay flooded, the creaky escalators will still cause me apoplexy every time I go up them. The food will be just as bad, the service will be just as cranky, the ushers will be attempting to hondle me for a tip every time they insist on checking my ticket for the seat I sit in every Tuesday and Friday.

The fact is that in the NYC Metropolitan area, the individual ticket plan holder is an anarchonism that the Mets would rather not deal with. They would rather be selling full seasons and then individual game tickets. In other locales, if you buy a plan of any kind, you get a discount on your tickets! You get members-only events!

Here, you get bupkes.

And of course we’ll still be there. Of course we will. And they know this, which is why they do it.