Rays sell 30,000 tickets in an hour

ST. PETERSBURG -- The Tampa Bay Rays sold about 30,000 tickets in the first hour of online ticket sales this morning. The tickets were for the first two Rays home games of the American League Championship Series.

"We're extremely excited and encouraged by the reaction that we've had," said Mark Fernandez, the Rays vice president for sales.

The tickets will be good only if the Rays make it into the AL Championship Series, which they can do by beating the White Sox tonight in Chicago, or if necessary, at Tropicana Field on Wednesday.

People were able to buy tickets from the Rays starting at 9 a.m. this morning only if they won the team's lottery. Winners were given a code to access the team's sales site. Available tickets were gone by 10 a.m.

There are plenty of tickets available online -- if you're willing to pay. Several people on www.stubhub.com were trying to sell Rays tickets for more than $500 each.

-- Curtis Krueger, Times staff writer

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Comments

[jake]

are you guys serious? man, rays fans are babies. MLB stipulates how tickets are sold...not rays. i did not get picked for one lottery and some got picked for all three, that is life...dont be a baby. i bought a passcode online last night for 18 bucks. logged on at 905, waited about 12 minutes and got 4 decent loge seats for game two. it is what it is. dont be babies...GO RAYS.

[Peewee]

Ok Alex, Its not like I have the money to put down on tickets for next year. Exactly why we are all complaining about having to pay so much, if I had the money, I would have done that. But I dont thats why I just wanted two cheap tickets. And I dont like to buy my tickets ahead of time because I cant always make it to the games with being out of town for work. So thats why the lottery came in good, but since they screwed that up, I guess not.

[Samuel]

Again I will repeat:

You retards who don't understand that tickets are worth MORE than the price the owners print on the tickets.

If you don't think the Rays held tickets back to sell on the secondary market, you're retarded. Why would they show any loyalty to this area?

[Alex]

If you bandwagon fans had bought a 20-game pack before the season, or put a deposit down for any sort of season pack in 2009, you would have gotten a full postseason of seats without all this effort an complaining.

Bottom line is that many people in Tampa Bay just want to be seen wherever is "hot" that day. I really don't care that you couldn't buy tickets.

[re: flsportsfan83]

You should be shot. Maybe some people don't want to bankroll your life. Maybe some people just want to see the game.

[Amanda]

I know someone who got the lottery code and was planning on buying as many tickets as possible this morning just to keep scalpers from getting them. She said she was going to keep what she needed, and sell the rest to Rays fans only at face value.
Don't know if she was actually able to buy them or not, but I like her thinking.

[Remember this next year]

Bandwagoners, remember this next season when it's a Wednesday game against (insert crappy team here). If we had this many fans at every game we wouldn't take a beating from ESPN and other sports media outlets.

Let's fill the Trop, in good times and bad.

[Bob]

oops...meant 9AM!

[Bob]

Somehow was lucky and won all three lotteries and had NO problem getting 4 tix each time. Sure was nervous as searching for 5 minutes but if in que right at open will be ok. Just be sure you are clicking on link right at 10AM (use official time website to be sure) and pick best deal seats for the money..4 upper deck infield! Scored row G, H, and J upper deck behind plate each time. Heres hoping not going to be surrounded by redsux nation! Go Rays!

[Peewee]

Hey Sam, quit your crying, I didnt get anything. You wanted them to sell them, I wanted them to go because I have been going since day one and now I am not going because the stadium will be sold out to Sox fans. The first round they sent out the email the night before, which made it harder for scalpers to get their hands on the codes. I got mine on friday, that was 3 days they had to get those numbers. This was ridiculous. Maybe it would have worked out for those of us who tried if they would TAKE OFF THE TARPS! what are they thinking, really? Its extra money in their pockets so I dont get it!

[Jenna]

I don't know where the 2 hour figure came from, at 9:30 I was getting the "there are no more tickets availble." I did get tickets for both games but it was a persistant waiting game though. If you deviated from the waiting page you were screwed. I was doing it at school during class. Thank god I have a computer class on Monday mornings. I did go on Stub Hub to see what the tickets were selling for that I got. 5000 was the most!!!!!!! These are outfield tickets. No way in hell I would sell the tickets, I believe in Karma and I know people who did try to sell for profit the last couple of games. They didn't get tickets.

[CommonFan]

I had a legit password from the lottery and started at 9:00 AM. Both searching for tickets and processing payments were extremely slow but the website never actually stopped or locked up. In the end I had successfully completed 2 transactions for 4 outfield tickets to each game by around 9:25 AM. Go Rays!

[flsportsfan83]

I got 4 tickets for Game 1. None for Game 2. My tickets are up on Ebay as we speak. Hope the Rays can win tonight so I keep my profit.

[Taylor]

It's called demand, folks.

[Allen]

Worked for me. Went on at 9 and got 4 good seats for game 1. Makes up for trying to get Hannah Montana for my kids last year. This I will at least enjoy.

[Scalpers should rot]

Because real Rays Fans were denied tickets the $20 face value tickets are now being scalped for $300. People in this area can't afford it. You know who can? Red Sux Nation.

So, Rays front office, when you wonder why the Trop will be filled with Red instead of Rays, it's because the scalpers bought the tickets and sold them to those who were willing to pay.

It's too bad to see this level of greed arrive at the Trop. This sours the fan experience.

Rays Front Office: There has to be a better way. You are dening true fans of supporting this team from inside the Trop.

[tjb]

Sam...your conspiracy theory on the owners is ludicrous.

[disgruntled]

i was trying to get tickets at 9:06am and every attempt to buy more than 1 failed!

[Samuel]

The ticket sale was an absolute joke. For all intents and purposes they were sold out at 9:10.

I find it unbelievable that it was simply not possible to get four sequential seats to EITHER game . For the record, I signed on and my search was going at 9:01.

I ended up getting two lousy seats for game two ONLY. DO you have any idea what that does to my bottom line? How am I supposed to proft off of this once in a lifetime opportunity?

They held back tickets, it's obvious. The owners aren't stupid, they know those tickets are worth 4x the face value.

[tjb]

Fifteen minutes flat and they were gone..the reason??? TICKET BROKERS...The Rays made a small mistake by putting out the emails to get tickets on Saturday. Those codes were actually being SOLD on sites all weekend long. Once the ticket brokers realized you could use ONE code for 1000 computers they just bombarded the system. So be ready Rays fans..if we end up playing "the nation" they are going to have tons of fans there. The Rays tried to set it up properly but alas their system was taken advantage of

[JC]

I tried at 9:00am on the dot and couldn't get anything for either game and the scalpers are ridiculous with their mark ups. The Rays should have done it by how many games you have attended this season, going all the way back to April, when only about 7,000 of us were there for each game!!!

[mm]

I had a password and still didn't get them. That site was locked up as soon as 9:00 hit. Oh well, I guess I will have to watch from Ferg's

[Peewee]

Correction..they were sold out in about 20 minutes. I was on at 9 trying to get them and by 915-930 I couldnt get anything, even when selecting best available. They sent out too many emails for the amount of tickets they had to sell.

[Charlie G]

They must have been gone before 10AM. I started entering my passcode at 9:15 and made over 50 sequential attempts until after 10AM and I was unable to get 4 tix anywhere using "best available", outfield, upper deck, home plate, infield loge, or any other selection. I have a T1 line, not dial up or DSL, and still couldn't get through to get tix. Unbelievable.

Yea, those tickets were up on stub hub before 10. I applaude the Rays for setting up a system so thier fans would be able to get tickets but it seems to me from everyone I talked to that sites like Stub Hub got in on it to. Now we have to pay more than triple for those tickets.