Consumer outrage over sky-high World Series ticket prices spilled into Ontario politics this week, as Premier Doug Ford accused Ticketmaster of “gouging the people” and said his government is reviewing possible legislation to reinstate a cap on ticket resale prices.
Speaking Wednesday at Queen’s Park, Ford criticized what he described as a monopolized market after resale listings for Toronto Blue Jays home games against the Los Angeles Dodgers surged into the thousands of dollars. Some lower-bowl seats for potential Game 7 matchups at Rogers Centre topped $10,000 CAD on Ticketmaster’s resale exchange.
“My personal opinion … they’re gouging the people,” Ford said. “When you have one player in the market that controls the tickets, that’s not right for the people, so we are actually reviewing that right now.”
The remarks mark a reversal for Ford, whose government opted against enacting proposed price cap legislation in 2019, calling the rule “unenforceable.” The previous Liberal government had enacted a limit of 50% above face value and banned ticket-buying bots as part of the Ticket Sales Act.
Opposition leaders quickly seized on the moment. Liberal MPP Rob Cerjanec, who represents Ajax and serves as the party’s critic for Tourism, Sport, and Culture, said Ford “created the problem” by scrapping the cap and tabled a motion Wednesday to bring it back.
“Doug Ford needs to learn that actions have consequences,” Cerjanec said. “He scrapped this policy, and now thousands of Ontarians who wanted to see the Blue Jays in the World Series are priced out.”
World Series Ticket Prices on Eve of Game 1
Rogers Centre will host Games 1 and 2 of the World Series this weekend, with Games 6 and 7 — if necessary — also slated for Toronto. For fans priced out of the ballpark, the City of Toronto announced free public viewing parties at Nathan Phillips Square for all home games.
According to Ticket Club, the least expensive ticket for Game 1 currently sits at just under $700 (as of Thursday morning), with an average ticket costing a whopping $2,378. Tickets for Game 7 are currently seeing asking prices for no less than $1,600 at Rogers Centre.
Read More: World Series Ticket Prices Hit Record Highs as Dodgers, Blue Jays Fans Drive Surging Demand
Ticketmaster and Team Practices Under Scrutiny
While Ford placed blame on Ticketmaster, industry observers note that the Blue Jays themselves have long engaged in dynamic and secondary-market distribution, effectively blurring the line between “face value” and resale.
As TicketNews reported in 2018, Major League Baseball teams — including the Blue Jays — have partnered directly with ticket resale platforms to release large portions of their inventory into secondary channels at market-based prices. Team president Mark Shapiro said at the time that the club was “unapologetic” about sharing in resale revenue, calling the secondary market “a fact” that teams would “accept and even embrace.”
That approach means fans rarely encounter true “face value” pricing, even on officially listed seats. A 2018 analysis by the Toronto Star found that the Blue Jays held back roughly 70% of tickets for their home opener that season, with more than 20,000 eventually appearing on resale markets.
In the current ticketing system, it is entirely plausible that a significant percentage of the tickets listed through Ticketmaster at all prices are directly distributed by the team – whether marked as resale or not.
Whether Ford follows through with legislation remains to be seen. It is important to consider that Ticketmaster would only benefit through the imposition of ticket price caps on the ticket resale ecosystem.
The company and its corporate parent Live Nation have been lobbying actively for such market controls as part of its “FAIR” ticketing legislative package. This system would combine price caps and transfer restrictions to allow for full monopolization of any event ticketing by the primary box office – a market segment dominated across the globe by Live Nation’s ticketing platform.
