I find it really interesting how upset people are getting over the spiraling cost of live entertainment. I'm in Edmonton, and overhear people complaining about how expensive tickets to the Stanley Cup final are, whether the base price the team charges or the resale prices. As if there's some human right that the average person should be able to afford to attend a Taylor Swift concert, or whatever event.
There's only 1 Taylor Swift, and she's only going to be able to perform for a few million people per year. There's only going to be about 100k tickets sold to the Stanley Cup final every year. If you don't want to pay through the nose, find some more obscure interests and don't blame Ticketmaster for supply and demand.
People are understandably upset that they are paying more to see concerts because an industry has arisen where people buy and sell tickets like its the stock market. Ticketmaster is facilitating this by giving preferential access to resellers while legitimizing the entire process by running it through their website while taking a cut.
I'm no fan of the resellers, but the reality is that the artists and other entertainers use Ticketmaster as a shield so they have plausible deniability about them also taking their cut of the reseller's profits as opposed to just pricing their events appropriately to the market demand for them. People are willing to pay thousands of dollars to see Taylor Swift or a Stanley Cup final game, regardless of whether they're paying the artist or team directly or through a reseller. Why should the tickets instead only be sold for a fraction of that if the market demand is much higher?
The fans bitching about overpriced tickets when the players don’t show sound like a bunch of neurotics who put themselves in this situation and then frantically look for a scapegoat. You buy a ticket to a game, you should expect that you may not see your star player. It’s called life. Shit happens. Suck it up.
I have zero sympathy for this kind of entitlement. It’s gross and misplaced.
And the grifters who see a profit in class action suits are the worst of the bunch. Bottom of the barrel feeders.
This is not the first time this has happened in North American soccer either. The old North American Soccer League (NASL) became popular after stars like Pele and Franz Beckenbauer signed with the New York Cosmos in the 1970s.
But then they retired, and there was nobody anywhere near that stature to replace them, and the league folded in 1984.
MLS is on a more stable financial footing than the NASL ever was, but it's so interesting to see the parallels developing two generations later.
Like all professional sports it’s entertainment pure and simple. Customers want to be entertained and will pay whatever the price is IF they see value in the particular piece of entertainment on offer. It’s a fantasy world.
OTOH, while it may be frustrating to fans of other teams, these guys are in their final years of play. While they may attract cultural tourists, if those tourists like what they see, they may return. (Jordan made basketball famous worldwide and Gretsky did a lot to increase US interest in hockey.) The additional exposure in North America and interest in the game will surely create better homegrown players which will improve play.
The league's weaker teams can surely band together to strengthen caps if enough franchises are hurting. And isn't it good to see stars get a big chunk of the money they bring to a game rather than the profits all going to management?
The law suit against the Whitecaps may go somewhere. I have a friend, who is involved at the top levels of soccer, say the Whitecaps were aware from the beginning that Messi wouldn't make the trip. Like many top players he has his legs insured but the insurance doesn't cover atificial turf like BC place has. Natural truf or no Messi.
I've never been big on him. All his success at Barca came while playing with Xavi and Iniesta, and now we know corruption at the league level, his last contract bankrupted his club with nothing to show for it. And yes he won a World Cup, playing on a team that is always favorite to win.
Having said that, extra money from butts in seats and jerseys won't ruin a league. The MLS was around before him, they'll be around after and they may even pick up some fans along the way. I don't like that teams are jacking up prices for when he's in town though, that shouldn't be allowed.
The team should be allowed to set prices to whatever they want, I just disagree with surge pricing based on an opposing player who may or may not show up. I imagine there are a lot of kids who had their birthday presents spoiled that way. Oh, and I make comments much dumber than that one daily 🤣
This was an interesting read. I heard about Messi joining Miami, but I hadn't followed the story after that. I wonder if more high-caliber talent will be attracted to North America from overseas in the coming years. Soccer seems to be increasingly popular in Canada across age groups. I think it's great for kids and accessible for parents. It's cool to see The Line diversify its content a bit more lately. Makes my subscription feel all the more worth it.
Part of Beckham's contract for the Los Angeles Galaxy was that he personally was awarded ownership of a future expansion MLS club when he retired from playing.
I simply do not get the writer's point here. Is he being rhetorical, or perhaps even a little tongue-in-cheek? Because there is no serious point being made here.
Superstars past their prime (and sometimes still in it) come to MLS all the time. Ibrahimovic, Beckham, David Villa, Lampard, Pirlo, HENRY, Insigne, Bernardeschi and many many others - and all for different clubs. The league had to adapt their spending rules to allow for what is now known as 'designated players' - players who are so good that they are clearly better than your average MLS talent, and so need to be compensated accordingly if the MLS want to attract better and better talent and increase the level of the game. Nothing wrong with MLS making the effort to NOT slide into permanent mediocrity.
By the way, that change can be connected directly to the increasingly better performances of CMNT & USMNT in world soccer.
Meadowlark Lemon....Andrew, you just took me back 40 years aka, the good times. Great article. The Globetrotter moniker is certainly true, but even the Globetrotters would not sit Lemon, or Curly.
“Load management” is happening in most professional leagues, especially in the run up to playoffs. The fans take their chances on whether the star attractions will dress or not, but there is also risk that a game might become a lopsided blowout. Who wants to pay for that either? I have only paid big money for one NHL hockey game and was rewarded with a close game and hard play throughout, but it could have been a 6-1 horror story too.
The Messi situation seems different though, due to his outsized influence to sell tickets in soft markets. To go from 15,000 to 60,000 for a Messi game is great if the Big Star shows up. If he doesn’t, then it seems tainted with false advertising issues. The league needs to address that.
I find it really interesting how upset people are getting over the spiraling cost of live entertainment. I'm in Edmonton, and overhear people complaining about how expensive tickets to the Stanley Cup final are, whether the base price the team charges or the resale prices. As if there's some human right that the average person should be able to afford to attend a Taylor Swift concert, or whatever event.
There's only 1 Taylor Swift, and she's only going to be able to perform for a few million people per year. There's only going to be about 100k tickets sold to the Stanley Cup final every year. If you don't want to pay through the nose, find some more obscure interests and don't blame Ticketmaster for supply and demand.
People are understandably upset that they are paying more to see concerts because an industry has arisen where people buy and sell tickets like its the stock market. Ticketmaster is facilitating this by giving preferential access to resellers while legitimizing the entire process by running it through their website while taking a cut.
I'm no fan of the resellers, but the reality is that the artists and other entertainers use Ticketmaster as a shield so they have plausible deniability about them also taking their cut of the reseller's profits as opposed to just pricing their events appropriately to the market demand for them. People are willing to pay thousands of dollars to see Taylor Swift or a Stanley Cup final game, regardless of whether they're paying the artist or team directly or through a reseller. Why should the tickets instead only be sold for a fraction of that if the market demand is much higher?
First world problems.
The fans bitching about overpriced tickets when the players don’t show sound like a bunch of neurotics who put themselves in this situation and then frantically look for a scapegoat. You buy a ticket to a game, you should expect that you may not see your star player. It’s called life. Shit happens. Suck it up.
I have zero sympathy for this kind of entitlement. It’s gross and misplaced.
And the grifters who see a profit in class action suits are the worst of the bunch. Bottom of the barrel feeders.
This is not the first time this has happened in North American soccer either. The old North American Soccer League (NASL) became popular after stars like Pele and Franz Beckenbauer signed with the New York Cosmos in the 1970s.
But then they retired, and there was nobody anywhere near that stature to replace them, and the league folded in 1984.
MLS is on a more stable financial footing than the NASL ever was, but it's so interesting to see the parallels developing two generations later.
Like all professional sports it’s entertainment pure and simple. Customers want to be entertained and will pay whatever the price is IF they see value in the particular piece of entertainment on offer. It’s a fantasy world.
OTOH, while it may be frustrating to fans of other teams, these guys are in their final years of play. While they may attract cultural tourists, if those tourists like what they see, they may return. (Jordan made basketball famous worldwide and Gretsky did a lot to increase US interest in hockey.) The additional exposure in North America and interest in the game will surely create better homegrown players which will improve play.
The league's weaker teams can surely band together to strengthen caps if enough franchises are hurting. And isn't it good to see stars get a big chunk of the money they bring to a game rather than the profits all going to management?
The law suit against the Whitecaps may go somewhere. I have a friend, who is involved at the top levels of soccer, say the Whitecaps were aware from the beginning that Messi wouldn't make the trip. Like many top players he has his legs insured but the insurance doesn't cover atificial turf like BC place has. Natural truf or no Messi.
It is not Messi who is messing up the soccer/football. It is the certain type of fans and managers.
I've never been big on him. All his success at Barca came while playing with Xavi and Iniesta, and now we know corruption at the league level, his last contract bankrupted his club with nothing to show for it. And yes he won a World Cup, playing on a team that is always favorite to win.
Having said that, extra money from butts in seats and jerseys won't ruin a league. The MLS was around before him, they'll be around after and they may even pick up some fans along the way. I don't like that teams are jacking up prices for when he's in town though, that shouldn't be allowed.
So you want to regulate the prices of tickets for soccer games? Not sure that's a high priority for any political party anywhere.
Who do you think should get a say in how much event tickets should be? How much profit is too much?
What about the secondary market? You are OK with scalpers making all the money of MLS tickets but not the MLS clubs themselves?
I think you win the award for dumbest comment of the year, and the year is not even half over.
The team should be allowed to set prices to whatever they want, I just disagree with surge pricing based on an opposing player who may or may not show up. I imagine there are a lot of kids who had their birthday presents spoiled that way. Oh, and I make comments much dumber than that one daily 🤣
This was an interesting read. I heard about Messi joining Miami, but I hadn't followed the story after that. I wonder if more high-caliber talent will be attracted to North America from overseas in the coming years. Soccer seems to be increasingly popular in Canada across age groups. I think it's great for kids and accessible for parents. It's cool to see The Line diversify its content a bit more lately. Makes my subscription feel all the more worth it.
A lot of this sounds like the Beckham saga from 15 years ago.
Part of Beckham's contract for the Los Angeles Galaxy was that he personally was awarded ownership of a future expansion MLS club when he retired from playing.
Beckham chose the city of Miami to base his club.
I simply do not get the writer's point here. Is he being rhetorical, or perhaps even a little tongue-in-cheek? Because there is no serious point being made here.
Superstars past their prime (and sometimes still in it) come to MLS all the time. Ibrahimovic, Beckham, David Villa, Lampard, Pirlo, HENRY, Insigne, Bernardeschi and many many others - and all for different clubs. The league had to adapt their spending rules to allow for what is now known as 'designated players' - players who are so good that they are clearly better than your average MLS talent, and so need to be compensated accordingly if the MLS want to attract better and better talent and increase the level of the game. Nothing wrong with MLS making the effort to NOT slide into permanent mediocrity.
By the way, that change can be connected directly to the increasingly better performances of CMNT & USMNT in world soccer.
Meadowlark Lemon....Andrew, you just took me back 40 years aka, the good times. Great article. The Globetrotter moniker is certainly true, but even the Globetrotters would not sit Lemon, or Curly.
The Vancouver Whitecaps didn't even get a chance to be the Washington Generals for a night!
“Load management” is happening in most professional leagues, especially in the run up to playoffs. The fans take their chances on whether the star attractions will dress or not, but there is also risk that a game might become a lopsided blowout. Who wants to pay for that either? I have only paid big money for one NHL hockey game and was rewarded with a close game and hard play throughout, but it could have been a 6-1 horror story too.
The Messi situation seems different though, due to his outsized influence to sell tickets in soft markets. To go from 15,000 to 60,000 for a Messi game is great if the Big Star shows up. If he doesn’t, then it seems tainted with false advertising issues. The league needs to address that.