With the release this week of the 2009 NFL schedule, ticket brokers and football fans have already begun to speculate on which games will be hot tickets on the resale market this coming season.
One of those eagerly anticipated games is, of course, the Thursday, September 10 season opener: the Super Bowl-winning Pittsburgh Steelers versus the AFC South champs, the Tennessee Titans. RazorGator, one of the first secondary sites to tout its NFL ticket inventory for next season, has more than 1,000 seats available, from $174 to $1,225.
StubHub, which trails only rival Ticketmaster Entertainment as the largest overall ticketing company, has tickets listed from $180 to $6,978, while TicketNetwork (parent company of TicketNews) has listings of $155 to $1,414.
Ticketmaster’s TicketsNow subsidiary shows nothing yet available for the opener, nor does the NFL’s official TicketExchange (also run by Ticketmaster) page at NFL.com.
Speaking of NFL.com, a fan poll on the site is asking, “Which game are you most looking forward to?” Tied for the lead with 22 percent of the vote is Week One’s match-up between the Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers, and Week 10’s New England Patriots at Indianapolis Colts game. The Titans at Steelers (Week One), Steelers at Baltimore Ravens (Week 12) and the New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys (Week Two) all rank second, with 11 percent of the tally.
For the Bears-Packers game, StubHub and RazorGator have ticket price-points starting around $190 ($165 at TicketNetwork), while for the Pats/Colts contest, all three marketers have tickets starting at about $100.
“We have been closely monitoring club ticket prices and sales: 75 percent of our clubs did not raise ticket prices this season,” NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy told TicketNews, when asked whether the slow economy has the league concerned about this season’s ticket sales. “We are sensitive to the impact the economy has had on our fans, but the quality and value of the NFL gameday experience continues to drive season ticket renewals and single game ticket sales.”
