Baseball Musings: Cubs Tickets

August 10, 2006

Cubs Tickets

Via U.S.S. Mariner, Derek Zumsteg complains about the favorable ruling the Cubs received in their ticket scalping case.

The Illinois Ticket Scalping Act says that if you put on a sporting event (or a Cubs game), you can't sell those tickets for more than their face value. The Cubs set up a sham firm, Wrigley Field Premium Tickets, which was owned by the same people who owned the Cubs, run by a Cubs VP, and even had the Cubs do their accounting. The Cubs would then funnel them face-value tickets before they were available to anyone else, which the sham company would scalp. I've followed this story since 2002, when two Cubs fans took the whole rotten system to court, and I have no idea how this can be ruled legal.
The best part about this saga has been the amazing lies of the Cubs that this scheme is good for fans.

"Fans have more choices [to] buy tickets," Cubs vice president Mark McGuire said in 2003. "Brokers should be very disappointed today. Fans who buy tickets through those sources will have more choices, good seats, at better prices, than what they would have if freedom did not exist."

Because those other ticket brokers, like terrorists, hate our freedom.

Yes, Derek, less choice is always better. McGuire here is certainly spinning badly, but his underlieing argument is correct. The Cubs are just another ticket broker in this case. The more brokers offering me tickets, the better price I'm going to get.

I do argee with Derek on this:

This allows a team to make more money off their tickets by scalping them -- and they avoid paying other teams revenue-sharing money from that income. I'm surprised the highest-revenue teams haven't pooled their resources to build a time machine so they could start doing this through baseball's history. (Kill Hitler while you're in the '30s, as long as you're back there. It's worth a shot.)
The big teams, like the Yankees and Red Sox, who have rabid fan bases and see an active market for scalping their tickets, would love something like this. Instead of pricing a seat at $50 a game and seeing a ridiculous third taken away through revenue sharing to fund the infant-like flailing of the Royals, they can instead sell that ticket to their side business for $20, scalp it for $400, and then use the profits on whatever they want: starting pitchers, three platinum Escalades for each executive (one for them, one for their honeys, one for their money), a personal hair stylist for Manny Ramirez, whatever.

But this is easily remedied by Bud Selig acting as supreme dictator and forcing teams to share revenue if they own the broker. In fact, I don't understand why teams put face value on tickets anymore. They all should be sold by auction. A ticket, after all, is nothing more than a futures contract. Teams, for example, could sell lots of tickets to brokers in January to cover their cost for the year. That puts the risk on the broker. Teams could hold back tickets, in case they have a better year than expected, and reap the additional profit as demand increases. My guess is that attendance would be decent for poor teams because people could pick up tickets for $1 the day of the game. And teams will likely still make money because the fanny in the seats is worth a lot in concessions.

And all though it's meant as satire by Derek, I really like this idea, at least the part about the length of the line:

Food and drink are priced up based on the length of the line, and then individually marked up further based on the presence of screaming kids and the recommendation of a facial recognition software that determines how much hunger pain a potential customer is in.

I don't like missing the action. I'd pay extra to be able to get a hot dog and back to my seat between innings without missing a pitch. Real time price information on an electronic display in the food court, including wait times, would be great. Let the markets work!

Posted by David Pinto at 04:13 PM | Tickets | TrackBack (0)

Comments

the more choice the cheaper the price of the tickets is theoretically correct. but when you have a dozen brokers in the area, and you add a 13th, those prices aren't going to drop, they are already set.
this is just a way for the cubs to make more money.

now if there was only 1 broker there and the cubs added a 2nd one, then i could see the competition driving down the prices a bit.

if you haven't been around wrigley lately, everywhere there isn't a bar, there is a ticket broker.

Posted by: Boomer at August 10, 2006 05:02 PM

The number of brokers isn't the supply; it's the number of tickets and their placement. The Cubs Ticket Scalping Service keeps the best-placed tickets in space (seat location) and time (day/opponent) and leaves the rest for the 'lesser' scalpers to fight over.

This creates an artificial demand above the already tight market, allowing the Cubs to jack up the initial price as well as the 'secondary' market price. Those tickets withheld by Tribune Wallet Munching Associates may have been the first target for scalpers, but they still need tickets to sell. They scoop up tickets that might normally have been available for base price at an elevated rate, causing a price increase cascade.

Yes, they can get away with it. Mostly. They are creating an apathetic middle class of consumers and instead targeting a well-heeled few. It's a wonderful quarter-by-quarter method of extracting short-term gains, but the long-term investment in the sport could well be damaged by making baseball a game played far away by rich men on my Media Delivery Device and not a tangible experience.

All of which wouldn't matter if gambling on baseball were more fun, but you're stuck with the hand you're dealt.

Posted by: Dennis at August 10, 2006 06:31 PM

The problem isn't the Cubs scalping, but the stupid law which bans scalping.

Posted by: Mike at August 10, 2006 07:22 PM

I cannot believe how unfunny Derek Z is. And his point is lost in the goofy attempts.

Posted by: Al at August 10, 2006 10:17 PM

This creates an artificial demand above the already tight market, allowing the Cubs to jack up the initial price as well as the 'secondary' market price.

This isn't really correct. Demand is demand. The price people are willing to pay has very little to do with how many are purchased with the intent to scalp. If the Cubs sold some of these Wrigley Field Premium tickets to me at face via the public onsale, and I think they're worth, say, $100, then I'll go... until somebody else says "I'll pay $200", in which case I'm the one scalping the tickets. The only difference is who extracts the difference between the amount the person who values them most will pay and the face price. If the Cubs didn't run WFP, the end result would be scalpers large and small making more money, and the occasional family paying less than they're willing to pay for prime tickets. For some odd reason, people opposed to WFP rarely stress the former.

People are willing to pay much, much more than $50 to watch the Cubs from good seats, and until the Cubs are able to price them accordingly, scalping will be a great business.

Posted by: Ron Galt at August 11, 2006 12:27 AM

Archives

By Category:
Advertising (7)
Agents (12)
All-Star Game (173)
All-Time Greats (217)
Army Strong (8)
Attendance (174)
Authors (3)
Awards (168)
Base Running (78)
Baseball (1580)
Baseball Jerks (214)
Blogs (730)
Books (112)
Broadcasts (558)
Charity (45)
Cheating (580)
Collectibles (15)
Colleges (3)
Commissioner (37)
Conditioning (1)
Contests (10)
Crime (90)
Cuba (1)
Deaths (160)
Defense (362)
Demographics (8)
Discipline (12)
Division Races (723)
Draft (62)
Equipment (23)
Fan Rant (45)
Fan Violence (10)
Fans (56)
Fantasy Baseball (38)
Feats (3)
Films (2)
Free Agents (698)
Games (5548)
History (96)
Hit Streaks (22)
Humor (57)
Ice Cream (4)
Illnesses (128)
Independent Leagues (16)
Infrastructure (3)
Injuries (1058)
International (76)
Interviews (163)
League Championship Series (1170)
League Division Series (923)
Little League (2)
Management (1239)
Mascots (4)
Matchups (698)
Mechandising (43)
Minor Leagues (12)
Movies (9)
News Media (95)
Oddities (1)
Offense (211)
Old Timers (4)
On Base (18)
Opening Day (210)
Opening Day Impressions (19)
Other (305)
Owners (65)
Pennant Races (32)
Pitchers (2866)
Players (1465)
Podcasts (185)
Post Season (59)
Power Hitting (5)
Pranks (1)
Predictions (139)
Probabilistic Model of Range (108)
Public Relations (8)
Records (152)
Rivals (2)
Rookies (44)
Rules (23)
Salaries (11)
Scheduling (22)
Science (1)
Scoring (5)
Series (61)
Simulations (5)
Sluggers (752)
Spring Training (104)
Stadiums (255)
Standings (25)
Statistics (985)
steroids (1)
Strategy (167)
Streaks (14)
Superstitions (16)
Team Evaluation (905)
Team Movements (58)
Tickets (51)
Trades (690)
Transactions (264)
Umpires (52)
Uniforms (16)
Union (21)
Welcome! (3)
women (4)
World Cup (149)
World Series (657)

By Month:
January 2009
December 2008
November 2008
October 2008
September 2008
August 2008
July 2008
June 2008
May 2008
April 2008
March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
May 2005
April 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004
July 2004
June 2004
May 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
December 2003
November 2003
October 2003
September 2003
August 2003
July 2003
June 2003
May 2003
April 2003
March 2003
February 2003
January 2003
December 2002
November 2002
October 2002
September 2002
August 2002
July 2002
June 2002
May 2002
April 2002
March 2002

Credits

Partners

Baseball Musings Ticket Store
Advertise on the Baseball Blogosphere!
Baseball Musings Fantasy Games
Sports Books
Fan Store

Patrons

Jan in Wellesley
Jack Spellman

Links

Baseball Info Solutions The publisher of the Bill James Handbook and a great source of stats.

ESPN.com's baseball page.

STATS, Inc. You'll find great baseball books and fantasy games here.

Baseball Direct Scoreboard This is powered by STATS, Inc. Good box scores, and good situational stats.

Baseball Reference.com It's like having Total Baseball and the Big Mac online!

Baseball Prospectus.com Wonderful commentary and analysis.

Baseball Primer Baseball for the Thinking Fan.

The Hardball Times Baseball. Insight. Daily.

Takkle High School Sports

Minor League Spilts Database Up-to-date minor league statistics, broken down by situation.

Inside The Book A blog by the authors of The Book.

Baseboogle A search engine for baseball research sites.

Win Shares From Major League Baseball Graphs.

The Transaction Guy A baseball transactions blog.

Japan Baseball Daily An English language site for Japanese baseball news and stats.

Doug's Business of Baseball Weblog A blog with a focus on the economics of the game.

Why I Like Baseball A Yankee fan writes about her favorite team.

Skilton's Baseball Links Links to numerous baseball sources.

Dan Lewis A blog about all sports.

Birds in the Belfry A site about the Orioles. Articles and research.

Only Baseball Matters A baseball blog by a John J. Perricone.

Jocksalot Lots of sports links.

Al's Ramblings A Brewer's blog.

Futility Infielder Jay Jaffe's baseball site. More than just a blog.

Mike's Baseball Rants Mike Carminati's baseball blog.

Aaron's Baseball Blog A general interest baseball blog.

Boy of Summer Travis Nelson on baseball.

Baseball Crank Dan McLaughlin's blog on baseball, the war and politics.

Bambino's Curse Edward Cossette's blog about the Red Sox.

Oakland Athletics Blog David Levens writes about the A's.

Ducksnorts Articles and Blog by Geoff.

Boston Sports Media Bruce Allen's roundup of the Boston Sports Media.

The Diamond Angle An online baseball magazine.

The Cub Reporter A Chicago Cubs blog.

Bronx Banter A baseball blog by Al Belth.

At Home Plate Articles by Jonathan Leshanski.

Dodger Thoughts Jon Weisman on the Dodgers.

The Clark & Addison Chronicle A Chicago Cubs web log.

Baseball Writing Joe Zibell's essays on baseball.

The Eddie Kranepool Society A Mets blog.

Mariners Weblog The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's weblog written by Shannon Fears

PortlandSoxFan.com A Red Sox blog from Portland, CT.

The Detroit Tigers Weblog Two Tigers fans and their take on the Motor City team.

A Rookie's Life The blog of Cleveland Indians' rookie Jody Gerut.

The Baseball Desert An Englishman living in France writes about the American game.

ChiSox Daily Mike Lubuda writes about the White Sox.

Shallow Center A blog mostly about the Phillies.

The House that Dewey Built Jeff Kuhn writes about the Red Sox.

SethSpeaks.net A blog by a Twins fan.

Frank's Field of Dreams News about Asian players in the United States.

Jay's Giants Blog William Jay blogging about the Giants.

Baseball Savant Cutting edge baseball news and analysis updated everyday from all aspects of the greatest show on dirt!

Athletics Nation Blogging about the A's.

Red Reporter JD Arney writes about the Reds.

Dominican Players Raul Tavares writes about players from his home country.

The Pearly Gates An Anaheim Angels Blog.

Red Sox Haven Randy Booth on baseball.

Tigers Weblog The Detroit News weblog on the Tigers, written by Tom Gage.

Management by Baseball Jeff Angus writes on how business can learn from baseball.

The View From the Bleachers A Chicago Cubs blog.

Cubs Now! Brian Hipp on the Cubs.

Honest Wagner A Pittsburgh Pirates weblog.

All-Baseball.com A collection of excellent baseball weblogs.

Soxaholix A comic strip blog about the Red Sox.

Most Valuable Network Blogging all 30 teams.

Baseball, Etcetera Andrew Godfrey's baseball blog.

Most Valuable Network, Astros Lisa Gray and others write about the Astros.

fenwayfanatics.com A Boston Red Sox blog.

Balls, Sticks & Stuff A sports blog with an emphasis on baseball.

Phillies Nation Brian Michael writes about the Phillies.

Batgirl Less stats, more sass.

Sabernomics Economic thinking about baseball.

Fire Brand of the American League A blog about the Red Sox.

Ivy Chat Chicago Cubs and other rants.

Baseball Evolution A group website writing about baseball.

The Cubdom.com Byron Clarke blogs about the Cubs.

Red Sox Stats Sabermetric numbers for the Red Sox system.

DRays Bay A blog devoted to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

Baseball Analysts Rich Lederer and Bryan Smith combine their baseball expertise into a single site.

Over the Monster A Red Sox blog by Randy Booth.

Viva el Birdos Ghosts of the St. Louis Cardinals past, present, and future.

Black Sox Blog A look at the current and historical teams of the South Side of Chicago.

Redleg Nation A group blog about the Cincinnati Reds.

Barry's Journal Barry Bonds' web log.

Hardball Dollars Keeping track of major league salaries.

Clem's Baseball and it's "Green Cathedrals" The resource for baseball stadiums on the web.

The Baseball Zealot Looking at the game of baseball from all sides of the spectrum .

Was Watching Laconic commentary from a Yankeeland zealot.

Bleed Cubbie Blue A Chicago Cubs blog.

Beaneball A's baseball from the heart of New York City.

The Writers A collection of sports writers express their opinions.

Yard Work What the Baseball Tonight crew would write if it could.

United States of Baseball Peter Handrinos' baseball columns.

Beer Leaguer Alternative veiwpoints on the Philadelphia Phillies.

Red Sox Connection Links to everything Red Sox.

Baseball Pilgrimages Stories of visits to baseball parks.

Fangraphs Multi-year charts of player stats.

Roto Authority Unique fantasy baseball information.

Yanksfan vs. Soxfan A Yankees fan and a Red Sox fan battle it out in the blogosphere.

Sawxblog.com A Red Sox fan writes about the home town team.

Oriole Magic An MVN blog about the Orioles.

The Baltimore Chop Joseph Jackson on the Orioles.

Lookout Landing A Seattle Mariners blog.

Sons of Bart Brush A blog about the Harvard baseball team.

Base Blogging A resource for sports and baseball bloggers.

Three True Outcomes A group blog by on major league baseball.

Cardinals Diaspora A blog for Cardinals fans living away from St. Louis.

Where Have You Gone, Andy Van Slyke? A Pittsburgh fan chronicles life in the Grand Canyon.

Brew Crew Ball A blog about the Milwaukee Brewers.

Getting Paid to Watch Posts by a former trainer for the NY Mets.

The Gas House Gang An historical St. Louis Cardinals Blog.

6-4-2 An Angels/Dodgers double play blog.

El Guapo's Ghost Rambles on about the Red Sox Baseball and the Red Sox.

Baseball Etc

Tiger Tales A Detroit Tigers web log.

The Baseball Card Blog A blog about baseball cards.

Sox1Fan A Red Sox blog.

Out of Left Field Another Red Sox blog.

New York Yankees Update A Yankees blog with lots of photos.

Liberty Ball A current and historical Phillies blog.

Crawfish Boxes A Houston Astros blog.

MLB Rumors Clearinghouse News from around the majors.

Roar From 34 A group blog about the Orioles.

Blogging Baseball All-time baseball highlights and real-time commentary.

Rubber Arm A group blog about major league baseball.

Fenway Nation More news about the Red Sox.

Rays of Light A Devil Rays blog.

Fantasy Baseball Chronicle Information for fantasy players.

American Legends A sports blog.

Duffy's Cliff An interactive Red Sox site, featuring a lexicon of the Red Sox.

Oriole Post - The World of Baseball and Beyond An Orioles blog.

DRays Bay A Devil Rays blog.

Mets Heads A blog about the New York Mets.

The Soul of Baseball Joe Posnanski promotes his book on Buck O'Neil and blogs about baseball.

My Baseball Bias A blog about East Coast baseball.

Sports Business Radio Articles and talk about the business of sports.

The Game of Baseball A blog about Major League Baseball.

Baseball Hot Corner Opinionated observations for the thinking fan.

FantasyDope.com Fantasy baseball news.

Peter's Red Sox Forever A Red Sox blog.

Sox Nest Commentary on the Red Sox.

The Big Oz A Florida Marlins blog.

Baseball Reflections Where old school baseball meets sabermetrics.

The Sommer Frieze A Yankees blog.

Fenway Nation A Red Sox fan site.

In-Between Hops A Milwaukee Brewers blog.

Right Field Bleachers Another Milwaukee Brewers blog.

On Baseball and the Reds Another Cincinnati Reds blog.

Crooked Pitch A fantasy baseball blog.

Bless You Boys A Detroit Tigers blog.

Cubs f/x Pitch f/x and the Chicago Cubs.

The Hot Corner

Eephus Pitch Tossing pure junk about New York baseball since 2006.

It Is High, It Is Far, It Is Caught A tribute to John Sterling.

Baseball GB Baseball from a British perspective.

Nick and Nick's Twins Blog A couple of Nicks write on the Twins.

SkyKing162 Baseball with a hint of lime.

Center Field A Red Sox blog.

Empyreal Environs Writing about the Red Sox.

Trophy League Planet Aggregating the baseball blogosphere.

Cardinals Best News Links Aggregating St. Louis Cardinals news.

Zell's Pinstripe Blog A Yankees Blog.

HSAC Blog Official Musings of the Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective.

The Baseball Fix A general baseball blog.

MLB Roundup A baseball video blog.

Fantasy Dope Fantasy Baseball News.

The Cubs Brickyard Hilarious fake news.

Spitting Seeds A blog about Major League baseball.

Infield Chatter A blog covering all aspects of baseball.

The Bronx View A blog and podcast about the Yankees.

Jorge Says No A blog about the Yankees.

Ivy League to MLB Shawn Haviland blogs about his efforts to rise through the Oakland Athletics system.

Instapundit Politics and the law. This site inspired me to start blogging.

Rookie Cards Baseball Card grading.

Wild Treasure Treasure hunts through the blogosphere.

San Diego Ticket Finder San Diego Ticket Information.

Prize Sports.net Baseball Collectibles.

Fantasy Sports R Us The #1 Fantasy Baseball Leagues site on the web.

RotoRank - Fantasy Baseball Draft Guides Customized For Any Fantasy Baseball League.