Baseball's All-Star Game a hot ticket; prices jump
CINCINNATI (AP) There's a hot market for tickets to baseball's mid-summer All-Star Game in Cincinnati.
With the game sold out for weeks and the host city within a six-hour drive for fans in a half-dozen other MLB cities, online sites and ticket brokers are seeing prices jumping above typical levels for the annual game. Even standing-room only tickets are commanding hundreds of dollars, with premium seats behind home plate being offered online for nearly $7,000 each. The sold-out Home Run Derby on Monday night is also getting listings for hundreds of dollars per ticket.
Austin, Texas-based TicketCity says median ticket sale prices have been 30 percent higher than last year's game in Minnesota, and nearly $100 higher than the 2013 median price of $449 the service saw for the All-Star Game at Citi Field in New York. Spokeswoman Ashley Kubiszyn credits Cincinnati's central location and attractive riverside Great American Ball Park, which is hosting the game for the first time.
Tickets were being offered Friday on the online marketplace StubHub starting at over $300 for standing room tickets, with premium Diamond Seats from $6,000 to $7,000 each. Those behind-home tickets start at $255 each for most weekday regular season Reds games.
Major League Baseball expects some 43,000 fans for the game. An MLB official earlier this week warned fans to be alert for counterfeit tickets, and to buy only from sources they know.
A veteran ticket broker said demand should remain high, because Cincinnati is within easy driving distance for millions of people who could still decide to come on late impulse.
''Demand started strong and it's staying strong,'' said Jeff McDonald of Cincinnati-based Riverfront Choice Tickets, which also goes by 333seat.com. He called it comparable to a Super Bowl or World Series.
''Internet action has been insane, the phones have been crazy, the number of walk-ins just keeps building,'' McDonald said. ''This is what we dream of.''
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