Dollar Off Per Hit? Help, Please...

by solotar on May 1, 2008 10:38 PM PDT

Although I go to about 20 A's games a year I never actually buy tickets at the box office. I always buy them from the scalpers on the bridge from BART. So what's this about $1 off Sunday tickets for every A's hit tonight? Do I buy these tickets on line somewhere by entering some special code? Pick them up at willcall? Help, please. Daddy's little girl wants a chocolate malt. (Good advice: If your kids are learning to sit through a whole ball game, tell them they can have the ice cream or the cotton candy in the 5th inning. My daughter has learn the 3 outs per inning, 2 halves to an inning think very, very quickly ...)

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http://oakland.athletics.mlb.com/oak/ticketing/howmanyhits.jsp

coupon code: hits

A's v Giants "is kind of like the difference between going to see the Ramones and going to see the Bee Gees. A's fans will go see the Ramones." -BB 07/27/05

by xbhaskarx on May 1, 2008 10:43 PM PDT reply actions

well

Now maybe you can actually buy a ticket from the box office, and I hope you’ll think about doing so more often. I don’t want to get in a big argument about this, but frankly fans like you are a big part of the reason that the A’s won’t be in Oakland much longer. When you buy tickets from the BART bridge scalpers, you are not helping the A’s at all, just the scalpers. I can understand this (I bought tix from the scalpers for a couple of years back in the nineties before I realized this was ripping off the team I wanted to support), but hope you will consider buying legitimate tickets from now on.

by Brian in 317 on May 2, 2008 6:07 AM PDT reply actions

ps

I like your kid strategy, very similar to mine. My six year old can get ice cream at the game, but not ‘til the seventh inning stretch. Until then, it’s popcorn only, and only between innings! She has now made it through several games (very encouraging since we always had to leave about the fifth inning in the past).

Hope you make it Sunday!

by Brian in 317 on May 2, 2008 6:26 AM PDT up reply actions

Oh, please

Every team in baseball, the A’s included, now has a partnership with a ticket scalping service where people can go to “officially” sell their tickets.

The teams have no objection to scalping in principle, they just want a cut of the profits.

On top of which, it’s likely to be cheaper to buy from the scalpers than it will be at the box office, because these tickets were sold for $4—so even if he pays substantially above “face value,” it’ll still end up saving him money vis a vis a standard ticket.

Your 2008 Athletics: It's Nothing Personal.

by PaulThomas on May 2, 2008 8:18 AM PDT up reply actions

Oh please

just refrain from commenting when you see my name. You don’t even go to baseball games, so I have ZERO respect for any opinion you have.

by Brian in 317 on May 2, 2008 10:17 PM PDT up reply actions

sorry that's too harsh- I'm in a bad postgame mood

but it comes close to the expressing the feelings I have toward your rather ubiquitous presence here at AN.

You really don’t need to explain to me the logic behind buying from the scalpers, as I mentioned before I was buying “discounted” tickets from scalpers in the nineties when you were a third grade pre-law candidate. I have very strong doubts that the A’s would concur with your views on the BART ramp scalping, but, regardless of that, it comes down basically to this: IMO you should support the Oakland A’s by buying when possible from the box office, simply because I think that the higher the attendance figure the better.

A’s fans are frequently ridiculed by baseball fans in other cities who look at the Coliseum and Oakland as bush league because we’ve got a highly successful and entertaining team who can’t attract more than 12,000 fans to a Tuesday night game in August. The poor attendance makes the A’s and A’s fans look bad, so I just think true fans should step forward and buy tickets from the box office to make the attendance figure higher. As someone generally disgruntled by the high prices of everything nowadays I feel slightly disingenuous in taking the corporate side (and perhaps the conspiracy-minded might even feel that Lew Wolff would look favorably on anything that would drive attendance figures down and fuel the “Oakland can’t support the A’s” argument), but I think it’s a true measure of a fan if they step up to the box office and buy that walk up ticket. That was the spirit which ultimately led me to become a 40 game partial season ticket holder eight years ago.

I imagine you’ll attempt a brilliant, logical deconstruction of my simple opinion above, but, as I stated in my original comment, I don’t want to get in a big argument about this. Maybe instead you should go out and see something of the world, maybe actually go to a baseball game (and when you do my suggestion is you buy that ticket at the box office).

by Brian in 317 on May 3, 2008 12:16 AM PDT up reply actions

I'm going to Sunday's game.

I bought the ticket at the box office.

I have no idea how they calculate “attendance” figures, but I was under the distinct impression that it was a lot closer to “tickets sold” than it was to “humans present”. In which case the scalper-bought tickets would in fact count toward attendance. The only sense in which buying from a scalper would depress the attendance figures is by turning a fake attendee into a real one (as opposed to buying from the box, which would preserve the fake attendee and add a real one) and, sorry pal, I just can’t get worked up over the fact that I’m not aiding and abetting the team deceiving the public into thinking attendance is better than it is.

Also: so if I “should” buy it from the box office, does this mean I “shouldn’t” buy it through the Oakland A’s endorsed, official ticket scalping website? The A’s don’t appear to have a problem with that, seeing as how they endorse it publicly…

Your 2008 Athletics: It's Nothing Personal.

by PaulThomas on May 3, 2008 10:24 AM PDT up reply actions