By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
A Trader Joe’s cashier was chatting about the Vegas Golden Knights as I was paying for an order this week and he told me the only Knights game he saw was in Denver when the Golden Knights played the Avalanche in Colorado during the regular season.
He said the home games were too costly to attend, so he found it better to travel to Denver to see his hometown Golden Knights in a time zone away.
I told him that reminded me of the Red Sox fans who would fly to see their team play division opponents such as the Rays in St. Petersburg, Fla. or the Orioles in Baltimore because the tickets at Fenway Park in Boston were so expensive.
“That’s exactly what I did,” the cashier told me.
The Golden Knights unprecedented first-year expansion team success has made a ticket to a home game at T-Mobile Arena a valuable commodity and it has raised a simple question: has Golden Knights tickets become too expensive?
Thursday night’s crowd of 18,444 watched the Golden Knights crush the San Jose Sharks, 7-0, in Game 1 of Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs. While the VGK ticket prices are high at T-Mobile Arena — especially on the secondary ticket level — the Golden Knights games have become entertainment events packed with a powerful pre-game ceremony during the playoffs and celebrities integrated into the in-game entertainment. For example, Absinthe performers did an intermission act between period 1 and 2, while ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons — sporting the ultimate NHL playoff beard — cranked things up to start period 3 at the big ice house on the Strip Thursday night.
Many season ticketholders, during the regular season, sold their tickets on the secondary market and made money much like a stock investor who bought low and sold high. The profit came with a price as T-Mobile Arena’s crowds were split between the home team fans in steel grey and visiting team fans wearing the orange of the Flyers, the green of Minnesota and the yellow and black of the two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins.
To combat season ticketholders from re-selling their playoff tickets, the team rolled out a two-tier ticket price system where fans were given a break on their postseason ticket prices if they promised to not sell their tickets on the secondary market via StubHub. If they didn’t take this “vow,” their postseason ticket prices cost more.
The team’s effort to create a sea of grey inside T-Mobile Arena worked in Round 1. It was a partisan VGK crowd and Los Angeles Kings fans complained to LVSportsBiz.com that Round 1 tickets for Games 1 and 2 at T-Mobile Arena were too expensive.
Golden Knights secondary market ticket costs for Round 2 at T-Mobile Arena are the second highest among the ticket prices of the eight remaining NHL teams, according to TicketIQ, an eight-year-old company that tracks secondary sports ticket prices. Only the Winnipeg Jets’ secondary market average ticket cost of $632 is more than the Golden Knights’ $621 in the NHL’s conference semi-final phase. It turned out the $621 price was down $70 from a $691 price only two days ago. Knights players Jon Merrill and William Karlsson told LVSportsBiz.com a few days ago that the high secondary market ticket prices were crazy.
About two hours before the 7 p.m. faceoff, StubHub’s cheapest ticket was $145.94 for Upper End 213, Row P, Seat 7.
While the average Golden Knights secondary ticket cost was $621 for Game 1 Thursday, the average Sharks secondary ticket cost was $261, and a get-in ticket can be had in San Jose for $92, according to TicketIQ data.
Of the eight remaining teams in the playoffs, the Pittsburgh Penguins had the lowest average secondary ticket price in the conference semi-finals at $229 per ticket.
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During Round 1, the Golden Knights had the third highest average secondary ticket at $484 per ticket, compared to the Winnipeg Jets at $489 per home ticket and the Toronto Maple Leafs at $652 per average secondary market ticket, according to TicketIQ. Lots of Golden Knights fans were seen at the Kings’ Staples Center because the average secondary ticket price was $172 during Round 1 for Games 3 and 4 there.
It’s not just the secondary market ticket prices for Golden Knights postseason tickets at T-Mobile Arena, though.
Several season ticket holders told LVSportsBiz.com that even with the “vow” and lower playoff ticket cost compared to not taking the vow, the increasing price of playoff tickets as the team moves from regular season to Round 1 to Round 2 is beginning to burn a hole in their budgets.
One season ticket holder who paid $125 for a lower bowl seat per game during the regular season saw his seat cost go up to $155 per game for Round 1 and now $225 per game for Round 2.
“Will the playoffs be more than the entire season,?” asked the Golden Knights fan who did not want his name used but his story told.
In the upper bowl, a season ticket holder said his seat in Round 1 was $50 per game and then it skyrocketed to $90 per game for Round 2 — an 80 percent increase from round to round.
Las Vegas sports radio producer Christopher Chapman, who works for FOX Sports radio in Las Vegas, said the Golden Knights games are entertainment events that justify the VGK ticket prices. Check out the LVSportsBiz.com interview with Chapman between periods 2 and 3 Thursday night.
The players recognize the Las Vegas game experience is different from many rinks around the NHL. “The energy here is unbelievable. They do it right here and the crowd keeps us on our toes,” forward Alex Tuch said at his locker after the lopsided win Thursday night.
The increased playoff ticket prices are generating millions of dollars in revenues per game for the Golden Knights, even with the fact that the players do get a cut of the gate revenues.
The Golden Knights’ playoff ticket is a hot commodity at a steep price compared to Cirque du Soleil tickets, for example, which have starting prices of $59 to $99.
LVSportsBiz.com will be tracking this issue and will be reporting from Game 2, Knights vs. Sharks, Saturday.
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