NHL Fans Are Paying Steep Price

The good news for Mighty Duck fans is that the average ticket price for a game at the Pond did not go up this season.

The bad news is that if you bring your family of four to the arena, it could run you $232 by the time you finish parking, eating and shopping.

The scary news is that makes a Ducks game only the 13th most expensive outing in the NHL, according to a survey by Team Marketing Report, a Chicago-based newsletter.

Dropping $232 only puts you in the middle of the NHL pack? Something is very, very wrong with the league.

Give the Ducks credit for not jacking up the prices this year. They joined the Kings, the Dallas Stars, the beached Whalers (a.k.a. the Carolina Hurricanes), the Chicago Blackhawks and the St. Louis Blues as the only U.S.-based teams whose prices stayed the same or went down. (The Team Marketing Report converted Canadian dollars into U.S. currency for this survey, and because the U.S. dollar is stronger this year the Montreal Canadiens, Vancouver Canucks and Toronto Maple Leafs showed a decrease as well).

But lurking all around are reasons and excuses for the Ducks to raise ticket prices next year. They still have one Paul Kariya to sign, and it looks as if that will cost a minimum of $7 million per year, $7 million that has to come from somewhere.

The other quandary for the Ducks is they play in a league that is more dependent on gate revenues than any of its big-time brethren. When it comes to the big dollars--TV--the NHL falls way behind the NFL, NBA and baseball. In 1997 it was the only league to show a championship game on cable, which despite its pervasive spread is still not seen in 35% of the nation’s homes. So the teams have to squeeze money from the small, loyal following that goes to the games.

The average ticket for an NHL game is $40.78, the Team Marketing Report said, marking the first time a league average has gone above $40. The average ticket to the NFL, where teams play only eight home dates compared to hockey’s 41, is $38.09. NBA games cost an average of $34.08 last season (this year’s report is coming soon) and baseball games cost an average of $11.98.

For now be glad you don’t live in Pittsburgh, where Penguin fans no longer have Mario Lemieux, but they do have the most expensive tickets in the league ($56.28) thanks to a 21% increase since last year. The Washington Capitals did not make the playoffs last season and their new arena won’t be open until December, but their average ticket prices jumped an astonishing 36.4%, or more than $13, to $50.36. A typical night at Boston’s FleetCenter, which lacks the history of the Boston Garden and the quality Bruin teams that used to play there, can cost $295.

Against this backdrop, it would be easy for the Ducks to raise their rates. They could have added $9 to their ticket prices and still not be in the top five this year. So don’t be surprised if one day you hear, “We tried to hold the line as long as we could, but . . .”

For now, Ducks tickets cost an average of $41.20, 12th in the league.

The Team Marketing Report compiled something it calls a Fan Cost Index to factor in typical expenditures. The FCI comprises four average price tickets, two small beers, four small sodas, four hot dogs, parking, two programs and two caps. For a night at the Pond, that would come to $232.28.

Having just received my Visa bill, I can report that you could get a new garbage disposal installed for roughly the same amount. And if you’re paying to watch the Ducks without Kariya, you’d be throwing money down the drain either way.

There are plenty of ways to cut down the price. Start with the beer. Parents shouldn’t be drinking in front of the kids at the game anyway; there’s enough exposure to alcohol with all the beer-sponsored advertising. And does anyone need to buy two programs? What happened to sharing?

Team Marketing Report took this into consideration and came up with a “Frugal Fan Index” that includes the four cheapest tickets, four sodas, four hot dogs and parking. The Ducks ranked 15th in this department, with a cost of $87.

The true price lies somewhere in between. You can skip the program and caps, but how many people can get by on eating just one hot dog? No pretzel, no popcorn? No way.

(By the way, those who do care to down a few brews at the Pond will be paying the third-highest cost per ounce in the NHL. An 18-ounce beer costs $5.25. At Tampa Bay games you can get 24 ounces for $4.75. Then again, Lightning fans are going to need those big beers to ease the pain of a 21.3% ticket increase, the fourth-highest in the league.)

So a Disney company that’s all about family entertainment finds itself in a situation where a family night night out can cost $232--and that’s considered a good rate.

The simple answer is to watch on TV, but hockey probably loses more on television than any other sport. You have to go to the games to get a true sense of the how fast the players are moving. You have to go to the games to hear the thump of a good check against the boards reverberate around the arena.

Hockey’s one advantage is it’s the best team sport to watch in person. It has the fast action of basketball and the violence of football without the dullness of baseball, unless you count the interminable wait between periods. But the NHL never has been able to benefit from the things it does right. These are the same people who missed their chance to ride the wave of the dramatic, much-hyped, New York Rangers Stanley Cup triumph in 1994 by holding the lockout that fall, and they have been playing catch-up ever since.

Now they’re making it harder and harder to afford a night at the arena and harder to take the league seriously. As it is, we’re forced to consider $232 a decent buy, and will probably end up looking back at these prices as the good old days before too long.