User:RahalMccall69

@@@ What鈥檚 lost is the traditional sense of community that builds up among season-ticket holders, who sit in the same seats, with the same people, season after season. Instead, you鈥檝e got people who show up for one game and may never be seen again. Not all of them are drunken jerks, of course, but it certainly creates the potential. And not all of those season-ticket holders are fans. 鈥淚 would say, seriously, that 20 to 25 percent of the season tickets are owned by ticket brokers,鈥?said , owner of San Francisco-based Mr. Ticket. 鈥淚 know some brokers that own over 1,000 tickets.鈥? A 49ers spokesman wouldn鈥檛 confirm those numbers, saying only, 鈥淥ur policy is not to comment on the numbers.鈥? Many tickets resold The new dynamic has turned traditional fan base economics on its head. When a team like the 49ers builds a new, billion-dollar stadium, ticket prices soar. That fuels Internet sites like StubHub, where local fans can cash out on their investment to offset the cost of a full season ticket. A recent check of StubHub for tickets to the next home game, on Nov. 2 against the , showed more than 8,000 tickets available for a stadium that seats 68,500 people. 鈥淲hat鈥檚 happened is the avenue for resale has grown,鈥?said of Golden Gate Tickets on Montgomery Street. 鈥淭he price of tickets has gone up. Five or six years ago a seat at the 50-yard line was $90. Now (in the new stadium) it鈥檚 $375.鈥? But with a little searching you can also find much cheaper seats, especially for less desirable games. Upper-deck tickets for the game with the Rams go for a little over $100, and the price may go lower as the game approaches. 鈥淧eople are getting in for $50,鈥?said Kesselman. 鈥淭he higher the price of tickets, the fewer the fights. The worst was the 49ers-Raiders exhibition game a couple of years ago. Every lowlife in the world got in.鈥? This isn鈥檛 just a 49ers problem. owner brags about his lavish, $1.2 billion stadium, which has been called the football version of the . He seems to be OK with resales by season-ticket holders. Tickets for opposing fans 鈥淎 large percentage of our fans don鈥檛 go to but four games, five games a year,鈥?Jones said in a recent radio interview. 鈥淭he rest of the time they ... go out into the market and they sell their tickets and get that money. And in doing so, they really do reduce their overall cost of coming to the stadium because you sell two or three games as a season-ticket holder and you鈥檝e just about recouped what you鈥檝e spent to buy the ticket.鈥? It seems like simple economics. But there are consequences. Estimates among media in Dallas are that up to 40 percent of the crowd for recent Cowboys games have been fans of the opposing team. Quarterback complained that boisterous visiting fans made the home-field advantage disappear. 鈥淭oday, we played on the road,鈥?Romo said after a recent home game. 鈥淲e just need to tighten up on selling our tickets.鈥? Good luck with that. This is the new trend 鈥?gigantic, garish stadiums, incredibly high ticket prices and an aggressive resale market to offset the investment for season tickets. Although teams like the 49ers would probably say they want to encourage faithful season-ticket holders who come to every game, there is a logic to working the secondary ticket market. First, as Jones says, if you sell some of your tickets, it makes the exorbitant price of buying a season pass affordable. For new stadiums, that鈥檚 more than just the price of a ticket. In addition to the cost of a seat, the 49ers demanded a license fee that ranged from $2,000 to $80,000, just for the privilege of getting to the ticket window. Second, having several different groups of people attend games can be an advantage for marketing. 鈥淚鈥檝e had discussions with the teams,鈥?says Ross. 鈥淲ouldn鈥檛 it be better to have five or six groups going to the game and buying merchandise?鈥? Of course, this is nothing new for another sport, baseball. Only an extremely dedicated fan will attend all 81 home games. But baseball is a different sport, pastoral and measured. Drunkenness goes on Football is violence and tailgate parties. The intoxicated, aggressive football fan has become a cliche. Candlestick Park was infamous for drunken brawls. But, the logic went, when the 49ers moved to their sparkling new $1.3 billion stadium, the louts would be priced out. Instead, it seems they鈥檙e buying one-time tickets and partying on. Ironically, instead of solving the problem, the glittering new stadium may have created the potential to make it worse.

is a columnist. E-mail: Twitter: @cwnevius

User:RahalMccall69

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