Industry News

MLB World Series ticket prices catch fans out

Tickets for Major League Baseball’s (MLB’s) World Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Houston Astros look set to be among the most expensive in the history of the sport.

Ticket market tracking firm TicketIQ has marked the average cost for all World Series games at $3,164 (£2,400/€2,691), which is just below the average of $3,480 to see the Chicago Cubs in last year’s championship series, according to ESPN.

Tonight’s (Tuesday) game one at Dodger Stadium is available for an average price of $1,171, according to StubHub. Tickets for this game are still available for between $749 and $35,000 for two Dugout Club spots.

The cheapest ticket sold on StubHub for game one so far went for $500, with the most expensive so far at $15,570 for the Dugout Club section.

As the series shifts to game three in Houston, prices drop, with the average ticket costing $1,036 at the Astros’ Minute Maid Park. The current cheapest ticket is $500 for the standing room only section.

The most expensive Astros ticket sold so far, at $12,600, is for the luxury Diamond Club section, which affords access to a bar, a private dining area and a 30-foot panoramic projection screen to watch the game.

“While both teams have average prices that are historically high, the Dodgers market is almost 10 times as big as the Astros and over three times as the Cubs last year,” Jesse Lawrence, the founder of TicketIQ, told Fox News.

Meanwhile, MLB saw regular season attendance figures down for a third straight year in 2017, with total crowds below 73 million for the first time since 2000.

According to unaudited numbers, year-over-year total paid attendance was down 488,621 (-0.67%) to 72,670,423. It was the 15th highest total in MLB history, but a fifth decline over the last six seasons.

The Dodgers again led the league in attendance with a total of 3,765,856, at an average of 46,492.

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