By Alfred Branch, Jr.
Heading into Saturday night’s NFL game at Giants Stadium between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots, Giants fans appear to have already conceded the contest. Fans in droves are reportedly unloading their Giants tickets to Patriots fans, in part because the Giants are unlikely to start and/or play all their best players for the whole game, and also because the Patriots are trying to become the first team to go 16-0 in the regular season.
Ticket resale prices have broken the $1,600 barrier, according to published reports, as Patriots fans snap up as many tickets as possible as they become available. The number of tickets for the game that were available on StubHub! as of today, for example, had reached 3,500, said spokesperson Joellen Ferrer.
Alan Gordon of JustGreatTickets.com told TicketNews that his site has seen a lot of interest for the game, too. “Giants fans are looking to unload them for however much they can to Patriots fans. That’s pretty much what we’re seeing,” he said.
Every year, the National Football League has to grapple with meaningless late season games when playoff teams are involved. The teams don’t want to risk injury to key players, only wanting to give them enough playing time to keep them sharp as they head into the playoffs. With the Patriots going for history, however, that adds a little wrinkle to the situation, which has sparked demand by a lot of Patriots fans who only have to drive a few hours or less to the game.
Ferrer said the average price being asked for tickets to the game dropped from a high on Monday of $277 each to about $222 today. The league average for tickets this season on StubHub! has been $151 a piece, and the most expensive average price this season was for the November game between the Green Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys, which reached $290.
Steve Stone, owner of Ticket Center in New Jersey, told TicketNews that while he’s seen the quick frenzy over tickets for the game, he stayed out of it because the prices were too high. “There’s no money there for us if we’ve got to charge a customer $400 or something. We’re not going to try to rip anyone off,” Stone said, adding that the tickets that don’t sell now will soon be going for a song. “By Friday, I guarantee you that a lot of those tickets will be going for face value.”
