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BoSox bat prices out of the park

By Christine Anne Piesyk | December 5, 2007 |

Sitting here in Clarksville, where the Tennessee Titans football is much closer that the World Series winners in Boston, I realize I am a long way from Fenway Park and its famed green monster. Not that I am a baseball fan. Or a fan of football. Or basketball. Or hockey. Or any of those mainstream team games. Don’t care. Never did. Never bought the T-shirt.

Nonetheless, as I read last week’s edition of my hometown’s non-traditional newspaper, and knowing that team sports play big across America, I couldn’t help but be captivated by a commentary on the state of ticket prices in major league sports: the announcement that Red Sox tickets would be pricing out at $125 per seat per game for the 2008 season. Wow!

Now I wouldn’t (and didn’t) blink at paying $100 for a cheap seat under the rafters for a Luciano Pavarotti concert 15 years ago, nor would I blink at $100+ for Phantom of the Opera on Broadway today. Those are”treats,” special days requiring special travel. Tickets bought months in advance. I guess the same applies to the BoSox now.

Gone are the days when a dad could fill the car with a couple of happy kids and take them out to the ball game. No more. At least, not to a major league game. By the time you add in the Fenway franks, some cokes for the kids and beer for dad, not to mention souvenir hats or T-shirts, the better part of a week’s pay for many people is shot. Season tickets are all but unimaginable. Real budget busters.

As Chris Collins wrote in the Valley Advocate:

“That same ticket next year will cost $125, up from $105 this past year and up from $26 as recently as 10 years ago, according to the Boston Globe. And assuming you can get tickets, Team Marketing Reports’ most recent fan cost index says that tickets for a family of four, parking, four hot dogs, two programs and two adult-size Red Sox caps will run you $313.83, the highest average price in the majors and almost $40 more than what the Evil Empire charges in the Bronx. ” — Chris Collins, Valley Advocate, November 29, 2007

At  that “family” total of $313, these folks have to be sitting in cheaper seats. I did some checking, and yes, their are “cheap seats.” Pavilion and loge box seats run $90 each. Grandstand seats are $30-50 each. Somewhere out there in the bleachers, you can watch the game for $25. In the upper bleachers, in nosebleed territory where binoculars are all but required to track the ball, you can go the game for a meager $12. There are a few spots on the 2008 price and seating chart still marked “to be announced.” There are more expensive seats as well: dugout seats go for $295 apiece.

Out of curiosity, I drifted into a ticket website for the Titans. More sticker shock. You’ve got to love the game [and work a second job] to shell out that kind of money for a ball game. It’s no longer a “hey let’s go to the game” kind of weekend.

While I wouldn’t drop a dime on a ball game, I would drop many hard-earn dimes on the arts. To each his - or her - own. Sadly, in both cases, these popular excursions are quickly pricing themselves beyond the reach of the average fan, the very people who have nourished their success for so many years.

About Christine Anne Piesyk

With 40 years behind me (Huh? What? How did that happen?) as a journalist, feature writer, investigative reporter, editor, and film/theater/arts critic, I brought my liberal New England activism to Tennessee several years ago. having completed a midlife undergraduate degree in community organizing and women's studies, and an MA in Interdisciplinary Arts. I am currently an MFA student at Goddard College. I served on Future Search Commissions for two colleges and an issue-specific commission for the City of Northampton, MA, and did minor undergraduate work in studies in urban planning and community development. I am a community volunteer and a member of FreeThinkers for Peace and Civil Liberties. I am a certified storm spotter. In my spare time (define spare time please?) I am a voracious reader, obsessive movie buff, classical music junkie; I also and design and make sci-fi/fantasy and renaissance costumes. I have an unquenchable interest in just about everything. I see life as an ongoing opportunity for learning and adventure, with the best things still to come. All posts by Christine Anne Piesyk as presented on Clarksville Online are copyright ©2006, 2007 to the author.

Email: womanspeak@yahoo.com

Sections: Opinion, Sports
Topics: Boston Red Sox, Broadway, Fenway Park, Lucianno Pavarotti, Phantom of the Opera, Sports, World Series

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