ewokpelts

There are a lot more high end merch/apparel out there now. Hence the higher prices. Majestic player shirts are $30. same as they were last year. As for grandstand, I read that they were offered to participate, but declined when the sox asked them to shut down thier store on wallace as part of the deal. So the Sox offered the store to Sportservice, who handled merch/concessions already. Oh, and grandstand aint cheap either.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Apr 13, 2012 -> 10:40 AM) Has anyone searched for Sox tickets lately? They completely overhauled the ticket system, instead of putting in a price range and seeing what pops up, you now are taken to an interactive map which shows you exactly what seats are available all over the park. It is awesome. They had that last year. You can also still look for tickets the "old way"

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Apr 24, 2012 -> 02:41 PM) I can see why the team would stay on WGN for Less money, but why on Earth would they stay on WCIU for less money?WCIU games are produced by WGN. The U gets paid by WGN to air the games.

QUOTE (Jordan4life @ Apr 16, 2012 -> 05:48 AM) Man, wtf? I almost had a heart attack when I saw Steff up in here.she used to be real close to albert belle.

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Apr 21, 2012 -> 06:32 PM) Seriously, needs a nickname now. No, not CoLd IcE. Phil

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Apr 24, 2012 -> 07:20 AM) If he finished anywhere below a 3.00 ERA, do you think there's really a change he would only ask for $7-8 million for two years? That's less than Mark Teahen made with the Sox. When's the last time you've ever heard of a star player just giving his team a blank contract? I think it must have been Andre Dawson with Cubs over 20 years ago. There's another thing to take into consider. The White Sox got back some form of insurance compensation for all the time Peavy missed in 2010 and maybe the beginning of 2011 too...so it's not like it was a total loss for them in terms of the money they've spent on him. It's like when corporations take out "death insurance" on employees, and the employee actually does die...does ANY of that money go to the family? Nope. It all goes to the company that took out an insurance policy on their employees. Athletes look out for themselves. It's not his fault he was hurt. Many would argue the White Sox are to blame, for pushing him to pitch in 2009...which forced him to change his mechanics, which led directly or indirectly to his lat injury. If you were Peavy, you'd probably feel that they actually TOOK money that you were going to earn in the future away because he's probably never going to get that 95-96 MPH fastball back for the remainder of his career. Jake got hurt the 2nd time in 2009 from a batted ball. It had NOTHING TO DO WITH his mechanics being altered/rushed.

I heard the Sox and Cubs get 500K per game on CSN, the same terms as their old FSN/sportschannel deal. So the Sox, with 102 games on CSN, get roughly 50 million per season on cable. The cubs, with far fewer games on cable, get less. And I was told they each get roughly 125-150K per game on WGN/WCIU.

I fully expect the Mets to get awarded the 2013 All Star Game now....

It could always be worse.....it could be "Baseball is Better Here"

QUOTE (LVSoxFan @ Mar 13, 2012 -> 10:35 AM) Well and you raise another good point. It's not like prices have come down. Last year was the emptiest I have seen The Cell since I've been going there. The only upside was that you could pretty much sit where you wanted because the ushers weren't going to chase you away. I remember feeling bad for the vendors in the UD because they had no business and often were gone just a few innings into the game. Okay I guess one other upside was that you could get on Stubhub and get fantastic seats for a steal. You got no such deals trying to buy Sox tix through their site. The Sox can schedule all the special days and bobblehead promotions they want but those gimmicks won't save them if this team ends up skidding throughout the entire season. As somebody once plainly said: winning sells tickets. And yes, LOL, the "Appreciate the Game" tag line seems like surrender already. um...prices DID go down. we had a whole thread about it back in early days of the offseason

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 1, 2012 -> 04:21 PM) This could be incredibly great for the pirates if that deal is insured. They could get Burnett's contract paid for by insurance and by the Yankees. most long term deals are insured.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Mar 5, 2012 -> 09:32 AM) Wolff, however, says that Oakland no longer is a viable market for the Athletics; the team ranked last in the majors in home attendance last season, averaging just 18,232 fans per game. That there is some bulls***. Perhaps if they stopped purging every bit of talent acquired, fans would show up. kick the raiders out, and tear down mt davis while filling in the foul territory.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 3, 2012 -> 08:07 PM) Theo is going to try to enforce a no-partying/no late nights rule on the Cubs. that actually HELPS the cubs! ask Mark Grace, whose job, aside from playing "baseball", was to get the opposing teams hungover for the day games.

Just have the A's take zito back. that's close to $50 million savings for the giants! in all seriosuness, this same issue happend with washington/baltimore. bud allowed the orioles to start up MASN, thier own tv network. And MASN airs Nationals games at a station friendly rate. Also of note is that it's a not a50/50 venture, the orioles own 80% of the RSN. So they will make money off the nationals tv audience.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Mar 5, 2012 -> 08:30 AM) There is time for a 2-2-1 series if you don't insist on having a day off for travel. while the players can handle it, getting the mlb machine as well as the full sports media up and running in less than 24 hours is tough.

QUOTE (Cali @ Mar 3, 2012 -> 01:36 PM) So if you win the second wild card do you get the same Shirt/Hat/Champagne celebration? Even if you only play in one game and get eliminated? Or does the winner of that game get to call themselves "Wild Card Champions"? knowing mlb, you'll get hats and shirts for being wild cards 1 and 2

I think this format will work. 2012 will be VERY interesting. especially come september. selig wanted it this year becuase the tv deals expire in 2013. And if you can offer a potential tv partner a sudden death playoff game(the wild card round), they'll get excited. espn has been salty for awhile that they are all but excluded from the postseason, and nbc is itching to get back in. And with comcast owning nbc(and partners with a few teams on RSNs), they may want a bigger slice of the pie. i also wouldnt be suprised if MLBnetwork takes the wild card games, seeing as they have high visibilty already on cable. dont forget that the newer LOCAL deals are extremely lucrative. if a team like texas, or both la teams is in the hunt longer, more value to thier RSNs(both the rangers and angels were awarded a stake in thier fox sportsnets on top of the BILLION they will recieve as part of their deals). and that can help drive up ALL local tv contracts. the white sox (and cubs)currently get 45 million a year, and the tigers are at 40 million. seeing as the rangers and angels are now getting 150 million PER YEAR, it's not inconcieveable that more traditional baseball markets can cash in too. but the rsns will want more meaningful games. more teams fighting for the playoffs will help that.

I was at a bulls game last night. The cash lots were $22, and the sign had the tax breakdown. $16 to park, $5 in CITY TAXES, and $1 in County tax.

QUOTE (Soxfest @ Feb 28, 2012 -> 01:03 PM) Saw this on another board If true JR really is being greedy. New city tax is only on parking in the "Central Business District" which I believe is bounded by North Ave., Halsted, Roosevelt Rd., and the lake. However far south it goes, Bridgeport is definitely not in those boundaries So why would they send me an email saying that the Rahm-Bo tax increase is the reason why parking went up? And why would parkling ONLY go up on WEEKDAYS? If they WANTED to rip fans off, they would have jacked up parking on weekend games as well, where attendance/parking lot capacity is much higher. This is getting stale. Let's "blame the jew" some more.....

QUOTE (J-MAN @ Feb 28, 2012 -> 10:11 AM) I agree with all of the above! I love going to games and look forward to the first game of the season and walking into the stadium and taking in the atmosphere of being at a game. BUT the cost of going is becoming prohibitive. When you add in the ticket prices and now another ****ing parking increase I plan on cutting back even further. We went from being season ticket holders to just buying 10 games or so for this year and if prices increases continue - will probably buy even less next year! I will probablly use the money I save to buy an HDTV and better sports package! Ticket prices went DOWN.....and stubhub prices can be pretty cheap too. dont forget that you can tailgate with your parking pass. that can be a lot of cash saved by not paying ballpark prices for food and booze.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 26, 2012 -> 11:37 AM) Personally, I don't think of 35th as being "Downtown", I think of it as being on the way out, but that's my NW Indiana perspective. i didnt say downtown. i said city. this law affects ALL pay lots in the city.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 26, 2012 -> 11:29 AM) Really, wouldn't you say that a significant chunk of the cars coming in always come along the same path as the traffic rush, people leaving the city?...and perhaps even more important, the Sox pack the nearby surface streets with people and cars at that time, making them no longer useful routes for travel. Oh, and that also takes up a contingent of police and associated resources that could be used elsewhere too. subarbanites LEAVE the city during the afternoon rush hour. sox park is IN the city. and most games are typically at night. and as most cub weekday games are matinees, the traffic is typically during the off peak time of 1:20.

QUOTE (The Critic @ Feb 26, 2012 -> 11:16 AM) I haven't parked at the ballpark in years, but it's still absolute bulls*** to charge 25 dollars for a parking space for a ballgame. That said, the price of parking won't be the reason I go to fewer games this year. United Center parking STARTS at $27. Bears Parking STARTS AT $35.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Feb 26, 2012 -> 11:05 AM) That's not a comparable situation though. How about if the US goverment charged Apple an extra 10% tax on every Iphone4s they sold. Would you expect them to then raise the phone price 10% too? Because that is what happened here, the city of Chicago raised the tax 10% for the weekday games, and the Sox passed it on to the consumer so they don't have to lower their price. the sox elected to NOT increase parking on weekend games, where they get better overall attendance as well as more parking spots sold. take it for what it's worth.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 26, 2012 -> 11:00 AM) Of course, one plausible response to an increase in the fees the city charges would be to rebalance the cost you charge the consumer and perhaps pass only a portion of that fee increase on. Sox season ticket holders got a tiny break if they paid thier 2012 parking passes off in 2011. That was all my rep said they could have done to help STHs. The weekday parking at the cell/wrigley/uc is counter to typical rush hour traffic. i dont see rham-bo's logic for making the venues part of the tax aside from the fact that the sox have 7000 parking spaces, which means up to 14k a game in tax revenue.