TORONTO (Sep. 22) — Imagine going to the Air Canada Centre for tonight’s Maple Leafs-Penguins pre-season game knowing you’ve paid $832.00 for a pair of tickets in the Platinum section. Clearly, you have no choice but to cough up close to that fee as a season-ticket holder, for the meaningless tilt is part of your 45-game package. When you arrive at the rink, you look around and notice that neither Sidney Crosby nor Evgeni Malkin are in the visitors’ line-up. Instead, you have doled out what amounts to a week’s pay for an average family to watch such luminaries as Ben Lovejoy, Dustin Jeffrey, Wyatt Smith, Chris Conner, Tim Wallace and Robert Bortuzzo skate for the “Stanley Cup champions”.
Though the Maple Leafs obviously have nothing to do with Pittsburgh’s decision to leave Crosby and Malkin at home, it’s difficult to imagine a consumer receiving less bang for his buck anywhere on earth. Which is part and parcel of being a ticket buyer in this city.
The price range for tonight’s exhibition match — though not a surprise — is nonetheless astounding. According to Ticketmaster, individual prices start at $95.00 and increase to $150.00, $165.00, $187.00, $196.00, $203.00, $217.00, $226.00 and $416.00. If you so desire, you can log onto Ticketmaster.ca and purchase a single seat in the very first row of Sec. 107 [right at the glass] for $423.50, all fees included. You can take your wife to the game for $847.00. That’s the equivalent of one week’s salary for a person making $44,000.00 a year. To own a pair of season tickets in the Platinum section costs more than $30,000.00, not including the seat-license fee.
As a comparison to how things have gotten totally out of whack, consider this:
In 1975-76, when I was 16, my dad bought a pair of season tickets in the south-mezzanine Blues at Maple Leaf Gardens. The cost for each ticket was $5.50. The entire season cost $220.00, which means my pop laid out $440.00 for a pair of ducats to see Darryl Sittler, Lanny McDonald, Borje Salming and Co. play 40 regular-season games. Imagine that expenditure being just $16.50 more than a single ticket in the Platinum section for tonight’s pre-season tilt. It’s almost incomprehensible. The top-end seats [Golds] at MLG in ‘75-76 were $6.60 apiece, or $264.00 for the season. The buyer of a single ticket for tonight’s practice game will spend almost that much [$226.00] to watch from the Golds at the ACC.
Crosby and Malkin played for Pittsburgh during last night’s exhibition match in Montreal. The Penguins were under no obligation to dress them for tonight’s game. Presumably, you buy your tickets with the understanding that line-ups are a crap-shoot in the pre-season, or you simply have no say in the matter as a season-ticket holder.
Still, the numbers are staggering.
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