So will the A's readjust ticket prices and offer lower priced tickets in the lower level of the stadium ??

You're a funny man, Bertell. The Chronicle article I linked to indicates that prices in the main lower seating bowl will go up this year, though the "plaza bleachers" (that's the first level of Mount Davis, I guess?) will be lowered from $18 to $14. Which is as microeconomics says it should be: Lower the supply while maintaining demand, and you can charge more for your goods.

I wasn't able to get this question into the chat (came in late) so I thought I would try here.

What do you think of San Jose's efforts to buy up land for a stadium and attract a baseball team (other than it would cost the citizens a lot)? I assume you don't think much will come of it given what you said in the chat about Magowan and this issue but just wanted to get your perspective on San Jose's chances of success.

Also, how much do you think the Giants could get in exchange for relinquishing their territorial "rights" to San Jose? I have my eye on a couple of expensive free agents and the Giants would need more money to get them. ;^) Thanks and take care.

Land is so expensive in San Jose, and construction costs are only going up. To come up with money for a stadium and land and paying off Peter Magowan just seems like a daunting task. I guess if Wolff totally gets nowhere with Oakland, maybe, but it doesn't seem likely. As for the Giants getting a windfall, they'd need it to counterbalance the cable fees, etc., that they'd lose by ceding the South Bay, so no Paul Konerko in your future, sorry... Though come to think of it, I wonder if the A's would agree to a territory swap, say, everything north of Solano Avenue for San Jose? I have no idea if, say, the cable systems break down properly for this to work, but it's an idea, anyway.

Buying tickets ahead of time? What a radical concept. As much as I love so much of what I read here, Neil, how is buying a ticket ahead of time such a bad thing?

And before responding, Neil, know that your co-author Joanna and my wife were best friends in grade school and high school, and I have a copy of the booked signed by her, to me. So I ain't all bad.

Thanks and keep up the (almost always) great work!

Forcing fans to buy tickets ahead of time makes them buy more than they otherwise would, for fear of being shut out. If you're from Cleveland, you should be familiar with this from the Indians' sellout run at Jacobs Field, when fans had to scurry to buy tickets in January. As soon as the sellout streak ended, attendance dropped like a rock, because people could now wait to see what the weather, starting pitchers, etc., were like instead of buying tickets months in advance. Same thing in Baltimore (where I myself once bought Yanks-O's tickets in January, only to eat them come September when I had better things to do than go see a meaningless late-season matchup with both teams out of the pennant race).

San Jose would be better off finding a home for a team that already plays in San Jose, and has brought the city of San Jose 2 championships in the form of MLS Cups.....The San Jose Earthquakes of MLS. San Jose should forget the baseball pipe dream, and focus on the reality of the new world order.... SSS for San Jose...

Neil, couldnt you look at it this way - you bought tickets to a game early in the year as an economic hedge against your rooting interests? you buy an option - a legitimate financial instrument with legitimate financial and economic uses - and you simply paid an insurance premium and never had to make a claim on the policy?

and for the record, from the north side of chicago, about 8 blocks from wrigley, and on the season ticket list for a few years already -

Neil, couldnt you look at it this way - you bought tickets to a game early in the year as an economic hedge against your rooting interests? you buy an option - a legitimate financial instrument with legitimate financial and economic uses - and you simply paid an insurance premium and never had to make a claim on the policy?

and for the record, from the north side of chicago, about 8 blocks from wrigley, and on the season ticket list for a few years already -

Neil, couldnt you look at it this way - you bought tickets to a game early in the year as an economic hedge against your rooting interests? you buy an option - a legitimate financial instrument with legitimate financial and economic uses - and you simply paid an insurance premium and never had to make a claim on the policy?

and for the record, from the north side of chicago, about 8 blocks from wrigley, and on the season ticket list for a few years already -

That's what the giraffe repellant salesman said... Look, I never would have needed the "insurance" if there were a surplus of tickets available. With Camden Yards, which holds around 47,000, it's not like I have much to complain about. If they'd purposely withheld seats from the market in order to create scarcity, though ... it's not illegal, and it may not be immoral, but it's certainly skeezy.

Point taken - but as a Cubs fan, TribCO could add a third deck at Wrigley field, creating a surplus by your reasoning, and still sell out every game from now to 2032 by opening day 2006 - guess what I'm trying to say is, maybe it really does make sense for the A's, from the point of running a business, to eliminate maintenance and other costs on seats they will quite probably never sell? And on a similar but related topic, are you familiar with the Cubs ultra skeezy in-house ticket brokerage scheme? Sell tickets to your own inside but seperate broker, who can legally charge 2-3-4-times face value for any seats they have? And they can do it forever - tickets mid september this year to meaningless games were being sold for - and bought by normal but crazy folks for - outrageous sums.

Shame. I always thought the Cubs fans had more integrity than to fall for a scheme like that.

Bertell - I'd like to think the real Cubs fans don't fall for it, but a visiting businessman needing to entertain someone, the obnoxious rich guy with nothing better to do, they will pay any price to visit the largest beer garden in the world - which is what Wrigley has become. I live a 20 minute walk from the park, and the idea of spontaneously catching a game on a random weekday summer evening is preposterous almost all of the time - sure, there may be the odd upper deck seat available for that scintilating cubs - devil rays series, but - quite literally - almost nothing else. I have been on the seasons ticket waiting list for two years - not because i want to, much less can afford, to see 81 games a year, but rather because me and 4 or 5 of my friends are just sick of never getting to see any cards or dodgers or white sox or yankees games unless we are wiling to fork out 250 a seat. We can get 4 tickets, scalp all of them to one or two cards games, and effectively have the tickets to the rest of the season at 25 percent or more off the face value. Sell a few more to the White sox games, and any big AL teams - yanks, etc - and you can end up with 60 or so games for the price of 10 or 15 - so, to refer back to my original post here, the idea of creating scarcity in the ticket market is nothing interesting or new or, for that matter, al that deceiving to me, as it is a fact of my very existence as a Cubs fan here in Chicago - I'd guess its similar for Yanks fans, red Sox fans, maybe some others.

in a city can having a franchise/ stadium economically help or not the economy? and if so how would it help it? if not how would it be made worse?