mets

Madoff's Mets Seats To Be Sold

Mets fans with deep pockets could soon get their hands on the seats at Citi Field belonging to Bernard Madoff's company. The prime season ticket seats are just behind home plate and will probably be sold by the trustee for Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC soon since opening day is April 13.

The seats were already paid for and are either in first or second row behind home plate, in the Delta Club Platinum section. They list for $695 each for opening day and overall the season ticket comes to $40,095 per seat, an average of $495 per game for the best seats in the ballpark.

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Tags: baseball season, baseball tickets, BaseballSeason, BaseballTickets, bernard madoff, BernardMadoff, citi field, mets, new york mets, NewYorkMets

No More Naming Rights Deals For Stadiums?

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Over the last couple of decades we've gradually become accustomed to every stadium and sports park bearing the name of a business which has paired dearly for the naming rights. That may be at an end for now because of the bad economy. If it is indeed the end of an era it went out with a bang, the new home of the New York Mets, Citifield will bear the name of the Citigroup brand in a 20-year, $400 million deal said to be the most lucrative ever (a deal they are honoring despite recent events).

Stadiums with existing contracts have to hope their sponsor company doesn't go bankrupt and become unable to pay but for those new stadiums seeking a revenue stream these are bad times. As I mentioned last October, the Cowboys have a new $1.1 billion stadium expected to be completed by next June and they are looking for a naming-rights deal that could be worth hundreds of millions. There are less and less companies now that would be interested in a deal of this magnitude. Also where once a deal could be seen as good publicity to a company, now there is the growing concern that such an arrangement might be seen as wasteful for a company, especially for companies which have cut jobs.

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Tags: mets, naming rights, NamingRights, stadium

Mets Sell Out Luxury Suites At New Ball Park

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Sports

Wall Street may be in turmoil but that hasn't affected the need for luxury baseball suites yet it seems. Bloomberg reports that the New York Mets have already sold out the luxury suites in their new stadium, Citi Field. These 49 suites start at $250,000 a year and go up to $500,000. Mets season-ticket holders are also renewing even though the prices for the team's first season at the new $800 million ballpark are higher (the top ticket price is $495). All this at a time when the financial services sector, traditionally a big spender on luxury suites for sporting events, is rapidly bleeding jobs. Dave Howard, the team's executive vice president for business operations, has said that troubled companies Lehman, AIG and Bear Stearns were not purchasers but Citigroup did pay $20 million a year for naming rights.

Not to be outdone, the New York Yankees are also moving into a new ballpark next season that has 56 luxury suites in four different categories and a top ticket price of $2,500 a game. The NY Times reports that those suites are also nearly sold out too.

UPDATE: Bloomberg reports that the Yankees have seven luxury suites unsold at $600,000 a pop and that they expect to sell out.

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Tags: baseball, mets, new york, yankees

Mets Pitcher's Jewels Lost and Found

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Jewelry, Celebrity Shopping

New York Mets pitcher Ambiorix Burgos has better luck than some other celebrities who have had their jewels stolen. Burgos, who reported $270,000 worth of jewelry stolen from his St. Lucie West hotel room on Tuesday, got his belongings back. An unidentified man dropped off a jewelry-filled black bag several hours after the bag was reported missing. Burgos told police his bag was missing after he switched rooms. Employees with access to the rooms said they did not take it but a few hours later a man came in to the hotel with the bag, put it on the counter saying he had found it outside, and ran away. The most interesting part of the story to me is that the police called Ambiorix Burgos Tuesday night to let him know but the pitcher was too busy to return to the police station to identify the bag until Wednesday. Perhaps these are just Burgos's traveling jewels.

UPDATE: A housekeeper at the hotel has been charged with grand theft for stealing the bag and Burgos says some items worth between $10,000 to $20,000 are still missing.

Gallery: Jewels Gone Missing