Tickets 101: sports on a budget

curb online

Tickets 101: sports on a budget
Big league deals and entertaining alternatives put sporting events within everyone's reach

by derek montgomery

Brian Jefferson still remembers the day when he and his dad drove nearly 300 miles to watch the Wisconsin Badgers take on the Iowa Hawkeyes in football. Iowa was terrible that year and the two found no shortage of eager scalpers willing to sell their tickets near face value.

Fast forward 12 years and the two made the pilgrimage again. The Temple Owls, 2005’s version of the Iowa Hawkeyes, were a pathetic team. Walking up to Camp Randall without tickets, the two encountered the first scalper selling tickets at a blistering $50 a pop. Way too much. The second scalper was even more expensive, as was the third. After circling around the stadium, the two eyed Regent Street and decided it would be cheaper and better to watch the game at Jordan’s Big Ten Pub than drop more than $100 to see Wisconsin’s third- and fourth-string players wreak havoc on the Owls all day.

“Tickets were selling for over $50 apiece,” Jefferson says. “And this was for pathetic Temple. Last time I checked, they were in the ESPN list of 10 worst teams. “Jordan’s [Big Ten Pub] is no Camp Randall, but at least the beer was cheap.”

Skyrocketing ticket prices aren’t limited to just college athletics. The past decade has witnessed a sharp rise in ticket prices for college athletics along with professional and even high school sports.

School districts across Wisconsin have been forced to deal with the rising costs of sports. Parents and students expect their equipment and facilities to be top notch, which shows in the admission price for many high school sports. The Madison School Board, facing a $10 million budget deficit, raised ticket prices to $6 for adults and $3 for students in May 2003. The increase is among the highest in the state and leads the way for the Big Eight Conference. Although UW-Madison may charge high prices to their athletic events, most high schools do not. Bill Tourdot, former principal at Viroqua High School and current principal at Sparta High School, said prep sports can be a lot more exciting than college or professional sports because students play because they want to and because they enjoy the sport.

“The athletes involved are in it because they want to be and for the fun of it,” Tourdot says. “First and foremost, to them it’s not yet a job or an obligation as it has become in most colleges and in the pros. The human error factor makes it more exciting because they are not as perfect, so you never know what to expect.”

While high school athletics may be exciting, most would agree that college and professional sports offer more excitement because of the faster pace and bigger names. However, with college and professional ticket prices seemingly rising faster than the price of gas, young professionals might conclude the likes of Miller Park, Lambeau Field, the Bradley Center or Camp Randall Stadium might be out of reach. Wrong bet.

“Most parks you go to these days have some sort of deal,” said Dan Fuhrmann, a UW-Madison alum. “In Colorado, they have seats on rocks in center field for only a few bucks and the Uecker seats with their obstructed views in Miller Park are only a dollar.”

Fuhrmann says the best thing anyone can do to find affordable ticket prices is to conduct research. Often times, fans can find deals right around the corner. Young professionals can save money and remain loyal fans simply by doing their homework.

Mike Haas, a lifelong Brewers fan and diehard baseball advocate says the best deals are often found in smaller venues like Northwoods League games.

“You don’t have to pay $6 for a beer, and they always have plenty of games and activities going on between innings,” Haas says. “The ticket prices and food prices at a [La Crosse] Loggers game don’t really compare to a Brewers game. The Loggers concessions and tickets are much cheaper than a Brewer game. Obviously it is nice to eat a brat at Miller Park, but you can’t really beat prices like $20 all-you-can-eat food and all-you-can-drink beer and half-price beers during the beer batter inning. It’s just a great deal.”

The savings between Northwoods League games and Brewers games are obvious. Single game tickets at Wisconsin Woodchucks games top out at $6 while the most expensive tickets at Miller Park approach $100. While it’s possible to find tickets for a Brewers game for less than $5, the seats offer obstructed views or are so far back from the action, the players resemble Lego men.

Additionally, if you’re driving to a Brewers game and want the cheap ticket, you’ll have to shell out more than the cost of the ticket in parking. If you don’t want to wait around for two hours in traffic after the game, it’s double the cost of that cheap ticket for the preferred parking section.

Haas added that the Loggers’ other Northwoods games give fans a chance to see future major leaguers up close for a reasonable price.

“Yes, ticket prices do play a big role in the amount of Brewers games I would go to and yes, there are cheap tickets at Brewer games,” Haas said. “But unless it is a special occasion game or a meaningful game, it is better to watch it on TV than sit in the top row. At Loggers games you can watch, for the most part, good baseball up close and for a low cost.”

While market dynamics may dictate higher prices for professional sports, there are certain times of the year that often yield the best chances for great deals. Tickets for preseason Green Bay Packers games often sell for much less than a regular season or playoff ticket would. For half as much as a regular season ticket, Packer fans can enjoy the same crowd atmosphere as they would in a late-season game against the Vikings.

For example, a scrimmage scheduled at the last minute between the Buffalo Bills and the Packers before the start of the 2005 season sold out in less than a day and brought in more than 60,000 fans to Lambeau Field.

When it comes to Brewers games, free tickets can be found while topping off the gas tank. Beyond Petroleum gas stations offer deals to loyal customers who purchase gas by recording the amount of money spent on gas by the consumer and rewarding them with free Brewers tickets over time. Gas is a necessity, so baseball fans would be smart to take advantage of this deal. The deals don’t end here, either.

The UW-Madison athletic department offers a ticket bundle for $25 that provides admission to students to a wide array of UW-Madison sports such as wrestling, men’s and women’s soccer, women’s basketball and more. Not only is this a great deal for students, it's an excellent chance to see future Olympians and overall amazing athletic skill. Corbin Hunt, assistant athletic director for and director of ticket operations at the UW-Madison, says the athletic department’s Red Card Program has been a great success in generating attendance at non-revenue sports.

“We started the program a few years back with the primary goal of boosting attendance and generating interest in sports not well attended by the student body,” Hunt says. “Last year we sold 1,100 and this year over 600. While the numbers have dropped, our primary goal is not revenue, but boosting attendance. Just a few weeks ago, we had the most students ever to attend a volleyball game, so we think the program is working.”

For the Badger fan not attending UW-Madison, the Red Card program and the cheap tickets provide many opportunities. Students will often sell their tickets before games, posting flyers around campus with information on how to buy their tickets or putting them up on eBay. More often than not, these tickets can be snagged for less than the price at the ticket office. Not only do fans save money, the ticket get them into the student section where the energy and intensity are among the best in the country.

Even at bigger venues like Camp Randall Stadium and the Kohl Center, the cost of hockey, basketball and football season tickets is a steal compared to some seats just a few sections over.

“Football season tickets are an amazing deal here,” Fuhrmann says. “The chance to jump around and watch big time D1 athletics is worth the price of season tickets alone.”

The deal might be even more valuable when it comes to men’s basketball and men’s hockey. With more than 10 home games apiece and the ability to sell each ticket for at least $20, many students cover the costs of their season tickets by selling vouchers for games they cannot attend. When Fuhrmann returned as an alumnus, he was able to find cheap student tickets before football games.

“It was always easy to get basketball tickets the day of a game because there were always people who had tests, had to study or just didn’t want to go,” Fuhrmann says. “Most of the time they were too busy to invest any real time into trying to sell their ticket, so they would often sell the tickets super cheap just to make any kind of money off them.”

With ticket prices continuing to rise across all major sports and at all levels of athletics, the importance of researching ticket options has never been more valuable. While it may seem daunting at first, it is definitely possible to find great tickets at great prices. Fans just need to know where to look.