The Dodgers second title protection begins in earnest tonight.
From the Grand Tour of 2025, which spanned three nations, two continents, and took each final day of the season — and then some — to this new marketing campaign, with a standard size Spring Training. What a luxurious. The Dodgers had the best record in the Cactus League, which appears off as a result of they didn’t have 28 ties, however no matter, I hope somebody gave them somewhat cactus for the memes.
After seeing mates and acquaintances gripe about how a lot they spent on Opening Day tickets, I assumed I might have a look. After seeing Loge tickets for over $500 immediately from the staff, I assumed I might test the secondary market, beginning with TickPick. I’m not sponsored by them; I simply abhor paying rubbish charges if I may help it.
What I discovered didn’t shock me within the least: one might have a look at a seat-map vary for tonight’s sport and be forgiven for pondering the postseason had already began. I’ve seen ticket costs starting from $200 to $800 and extra, relying on location.
For Opening Night, the Dodger tax is in full impact, with everybody paying like a highway fan on Thursday. I’ve seen the groans and complaints as information of costs has turn into extra widespread. I had the next benign response to the information:
In my travels, I’ve lengthy grown accustomed to paying out the nostril for Dodgers tickets. With gentle reductions to each the ground and ceiling of costs, I might swap tonight’s costs for video games in San Diego, San Francisco, Atlanta, New York (each Queens and the Bronx), Seattle, West Sacramento, and so on.
That assertion apart, I’ve full sympathy for anybody experiencing sticker shock. It stinks.
Granted, these costs are completely lovely in comparison with Game 1 of the 2025 season, however at the very least I had the great fortune to be in Tokyo once I plunked down the worth of two used vehicles for my tickets to Game 1 and Game 2 of the 2025 marketing campaign.
One comfort for the monetary ache was that the video games have been an precise showcase worldwide occasion that one way or the other spawned a mediocre documentary that one can literally start streaming on CNN’s streaming platform today. The Tokyo Series mattered, in contrast to the abomination that performed out in San Francisco final night time. The logic of “Netflix paid us money” is probably going the one justification for beginning the 2026 marketing campaign with two literal also-rans.
Incidentally, the ticket for 2025’s Game 1 cost greater than the ticket for 2025’s Game 179, albeit not by a lot. The sticker value for each tickets was comparable; it was simply that capitalism (and the corresponding demand) exploded as deliberate.
Regardless, I perceive the argument that the Dodgers have succeeded a lot that they’re now on the cusp or have began negatively affecting those that would identical to to benefit from the journey: the informal fan.
The rush hour prepare is crowded
As somebody who doesn’t go to Los Angeles often, I don’t discover the inflow of bandwagon and informal followers a giant deal. Success breeds a celebration everybody needs to attend till they’re priced out. No one needs to pay a premium value for video games that don’t, therefore the modest attendance for the Freeway Series’ finale on March 24.
We should not have to depend on anecdotal proof for this declare both. Michael Duarte of the California Post reported on March 19 in regards to the booming costs of baseball tickets in 2026, focusing partially on how the Dodgers are main the best way:
Baseball is booming and so are the ticket costs. In 2026, ticket costs depend upon the place you sit and which staff you’re watching.
Here in California, the divide isn’t delicate. It’s as massive because the Grand Canyon.
The Los Angeles Dodgers don’t simply lead Major League Baseball in ticket prices this yr, they truthfully belong in one other financial class altogether.
The common minimal ticket value at Dodger Stadium sits at $76.57, practically double the MLB common of $34.82…
…On common throughout the league, when the Dodgers come to city, the most affordable ticket within the ballpark jumps to $62.51. The solely different staff in that stratosphere is the rival Yankees.
Mr. Duarte will not be precisely reporting breaking information right here, particularly as to the highway entrance. Factor within the common ticket value, the $45 parking price (until you booked forward of time, saving $5), the costs for foods and drinks (heaven forbid, alcohol), and one is taking a look at a several-hundred-dollar expenditure for a household of 4 or extra to see the Dodgers in particular person.
It is extensively believed that the Dodgers pulled in over $1 billion in income final yr, topping the four-million mark in attendance for the first time in franchise history. Note that I didn’t say “profit,” however given the staff’s notion drawback, the excellence will probably be misplaced on most. I’ve harped on this level earlier than: does the staff have to extract each nickel and dime it may well out of its fanbase?
Would a five-dollar scorching canine, a refillable soda, and capping the costs of sure tickets actually break the franchise and critically gradual the Dodgers’ monetary juggernaut?
I keep in mind once I was so broke that I might solely cobble collectively the funds to go to a single sport at Dodger Stadium a yr. If you got here again to inform me in 2012, after seeing Chris Capuano “pitch”, that 14 years later I might be working for a web site I used to be then intermittently studying and going to 17 Dodgers games in seven cities, phrases fail me as to how badly I might deal with that hypothetical social interplay.
I might in all probability see it as a singular kind of bullying; that’s how broke I used to be throughout these days.
In baseball’s golden age, seating was seen as an incredible democratic (small d) equalizer, as you’d have members of completely different social and financial courses mixed in to observe baseball. That horse is up to now gone from the figurative barn that it has died from previous age from operating free.
There isn’t any going again; if you’d like a greater view, it’s a must to pay for it. Baseball groups have been catering to the 1% of earners, its whales, for a very long time now.
If I might change one factor in regards to the operation of the Dodgers (I can’t) or if the Dodgers have been within the public relations boon that will come up from following my recommendation (they don’t seem to be and they won’t), I might implement the next adjustments on ticket costs for the common season going ahead:
- No bleacher seat ought to cost greater than $25 out the door.
- No higher deck seat ought to cost greater than $40 out the door.
I’m being fully arbitrary, working purely on the vibes, as the kids say. I merely requested myself what 2012-me would have thought of truthful. If the Dodgers’ financial engine is wholly devoted to operating on the backs of these sitting within the literal low-cost seats, so be it. But with out wanting into the staff’s monetary books, I believe that each one the company and sponsorship cash, together with the media deal, are largely maintaining the proverbial ship afloat.
Plus, think about the public-relations bonanza if the staff introduced such a transfer; it might flummox the naysayers with a single announcement. Two extra steps could be wanted to thwart scalpers and others who would search to destroy factor. Oddly sufficient, one step comes from what I’ve seen different franchises do, and the opposite step comes from the Savannah Bananas, of all individuals.
This yr, when acquiring my Phillies tickets immediately from the staff, they have been initially geolocked to residents of Philadelphia and the encircling counties. I don’t dwell in Pennsylvania, and I used to be prompted to name the ticket workplace. I did, and ten minutes later, after declaring that I used to be not a scalper and that I used to be solely after one ticket for one sport, the transaction was accomplished with nary a feather ruffled.
Generally, a setup just like the one described above thwarts, or at the very least slows, the automated laptop bot that may react quicker than a human. The solely manner to make sure these tickets wouldn’t fall into the fingers of mass sellers who would then be happy to lift the worth as a lot as they need, to take a web page from the Savannah Bananas, who have been impressed by how music acts fight scalpers: by cutting out the middleman and becoming the only outlet to sell tickets.
Such measures would imply extra work and fewer revenue for the Dodgers, which is probably going a non-starter. The state of affairs appears more likely to hit a breaking level with individuals’s funds, particularly in a quickly spiraling economic system. Where that breaking level truly is is anybody’s guess.
Feedback on Dodger Stadium Express
For these going to video games at Dodger Stadium within the subsequent week or two, I might significantly recognize suggestions (posted within the feedback of this essay or on BlueSky) on the wait occasions to get to and depart Dodger Stadium after video games. There have been adjustments applied within the last third of the 2025 season, and I’m engaged on a follow-up evaluation essay for which I have to crowdsource anecdotal knowledge, as I’m bodily unable to gather it myself.
Any help could be significantly appreciated.
