As usual, the Yankees website is basically useless when it comes to finding out simple ticket information. Many Yankee fans are itching for additional information regarding some of the more interesting seating options in the new Yankee Stadium. Being the intrepid reporters that we are, we did the digging in order to save you the time. Here is the information:
Bleacher Cafe
A view from the Bleacher Cafe seats, courtesy of the 3-D seat selector on Yankees.com
PRICE
$125 in advance
UNKNOWN day of game
Information Source: Ticketmaster.com, confirmed by an article published in NY Magazine this week.
These seats are the Yankees answer to the "Green Monster" seats and are perched atop the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar. We have been told by multiple sources that the view is amazing, and we can confirm that the view from behind them is very majestic. That being said, these seats are being billed as the equivalent to the Green Monster seats at Fenway, but they are nothing like them. While the Green Monster seats are a little over 300 feet away from home plate, these are over 500 feet away. The $125 price tag while bleacher seats directly adjacent are $12 is sure to leave a bad taste in buyer's mouths. As far as we know, these seats don't come with any special amenities, not even admission to the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar directly below. $60 would have been a reasonable price for these seats.
Mohegan Sun Sports Bar
A view from the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar seats, courtesy of the 3-D seat selector on Yankees.com
PRICE
$90 in advance
$95 day of game
Full-season membership available to full-season, 41, or 20 game plan holders with field level seats ONLY for $750.
Information Source: As of yet unpublished information via a reliable ticket office source, Yankees.com A-Z Guide.
We have spent a lot of time discussing these fascinating seats. At first we were told they were only membership, then we were told they were only ticketed, now we can confirm that that the bar will be a hybrid, and the non-seating areas of the bar will be for members:
The Mohegan Sun Sports Bar, one of two membership clubs in Yankee Stadium, is a spacious, air-conditioned space located in centerfield above historic Monument Park. Its location allows for great views of the playing field as well as Monument Park below. Two cocktail bars are located inside, and guests can watch the game through the windows facing the playing field or on various high-definition video monitors inside the bar. Individual-game tickets are also available. For information, please visit www.yankees.com.The Yankee somehow manage to get everything wrong. Why would they make things even more elitist and only allow Field Level ticket holders into the sports bar? According to our source, it is due to very limited space inside of the bar. On the other hand, the Yankees are probably just cutting to the chase - the only people affluent enough to pay $750 for a membership that allows them to buy drinks in a sports bar at a baseball stadium are the field level ticket holders.
There will not be a membership card with a barcode to get in. Each member will receive a paper ticket that is good for each different game. The Yankees somehow see this as a means of preventing scalping, but we don't quite understand the logic:
the passes will be printed on an individual game basis in a booklet (no barcodes). Hopefully we don't have as many people selling the passes as "tickets" to the game on craigslist or ebay as the membership passes won't get you through the gates and will only get you into the designated areas.Isn't it easier to sell that paper membership pass than it would be something with a barcode? Wouldn't it have prevented scalping to somehow build the membership onto the barcode of the individual game tickets, since only season ticket holders are allowed to purchase the membership? Even providing the members with some sort of membership card would have been a better idea. We'll have to be on the lookout for those passes on the secondary market so we can check out the exclusive sports bar. It is interesting to note that those people paying $750 for the season pass will never be allowed to sit in the seats at the front of the bar, facing the field, as those are reserved for specific ticket holders.
Speaking of the seats, if the view on the 3-D seat selector is any indication, you can expect to be annoyed by partitions separating the glass panels when trying to view the game through the window. Paying $95 to sit in a sports bar does not seem like a great deal to us, but perhaps we are overly negative? $75 would be fair, especially if they threw in a voucher for a hot dog and a soda. As for the $750 membership, we mentioned previously that it would have been a great deal for an obstructed view bleacher creature, but it looks like that is not an option. Go figure.
Audi Yankees Club
A view from the Audi Yankees Club seats, courtesy of the 3-D seat selector on Yankees.com
PRICE
$75+$65 facility fee = $140 advance (includes unlimited food and drink, excluding alcohol)
TBD day of game
Full-season membership available to any season ticket holder for $975 (unlimited food NOT included for people with a membership). Tiered pricing for lower plans.
Information Source: As of yet unpublished information via a reliable ticket office source
The Mets used to have a crappy "box" like this at Shea Stadium. They would stick you out in crappy seats in left field and overcharg you because you had "unlimited food." At Shea, the food was the low-end Aramark catering, so it was hardly a deal. Then again, they didn't charge $140 for a ticket, or $975 for a membership for those seats. Even worse, the unlimited food is ONLY available for the people ticketed per game, and NOT for people with a membership. Therefore, we don't quite see the value in a membership.
If you plan on spending more than $975 on food and non-alcoholic beverages while at Yankee games this year, you should jump on this. We don't know the menu for the Audi Yankees Club, but if you have $5 obstructed view seats in the left field bleachers, and you can get unlimited food and shelter in bad weather for $975, in might not be a terrible idea.
A more reasonable, but still overpriced price for the individual game tickets in this section would have been $50 for the ticket and $50 for the food, on an individual game basis. $140 is pretty absurd. Who would pay that?
For the record, the passes for the Audi Yankees Club will work the same way as the passes for the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar. With your membership, you will have the chance to pay to eat what they claim is top-notch food. Time will tell if the food will actually be as advertised.
While we'd love to check out a game from all of these locations, it appears that the Yankees have priced us out. In the case of the Bleacher Cafe seats, there are just too many other spots in the stadium that offer similar views for 1/8th of the price. According to Ticketmaster.com, tickets are still available in the Bleacher Cafe seats for the first two series at home, excluding Opening Day. Beyond that, it doesn't look like the Yankees have made them available. This seems to indicate that they are not too confident in the $125 price going over well with fans, and there is the potential for it to change.
The Audi Yankees Club is not a good deal, no matter how the Yankees spin it. We spent way too much time deciphering how much you needed to spend on food daily to make the membership worth it, and then found out that food isn't even included when you pay $975 for a membership. We're not quite sure what that $975 is getting for people.
We can't even consider the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar tickets because we are not special enough to have season tickets on the Field Level. Any predictions on how long that policy lasts? Unless they are offering some kind of free food with that $750 membership (and they're not), it is the second worst value in the entire stadium, trailing only the Audi Yankees Club.
