Yankees Turning to Groupon as Attendance Drops

There's clearly been a direct affect of a chillier spring on attendance at New York Yankees games, but it's nothing compared to what the price of tickets, food, beverage,  parking and/or mass transit has done to keep fans away. The Yankees wanted to build a palace and they did, but they priced out the average baseball fan in the process. The Steinbrenners still don't seem to understand that.

Fans turned en masse to Stub Hub the last few years to find cheaper seats. The Steinbrenners didn't dig that tactic, so they made it harder for fans to get seats this year through Stub Hub (no e-tickets, no pick up window near the Stadium) and came up with their own re-sale plan with Ticketmaster. Yeah, that ticked off fans too. Everyone hates Ticketmaster.

Now the Yankees are turning to discount broker Groupon to sell tickets to games that aren't as attractive to fans.  Through Groupon, fans can buy seats up to 54% off for a series with the Seattle Mariners May 14-16 and the Cleveland Indians June 3-5.

Here's an idea Yankees. Drop your ticket prices, your hot dog prices, your beer prices, your parking prices. Remember...over there at the old Stadium...plenty of people in the seats. And maybe you can put mannequins in the Legends Seats to make it look more people are there. Or hire seat fillers like they do at the Oscars.  Yeah, that's the (overpriced ticket).

Fans are willing to pay to see Derek Jeter, but at these prices people don't want to pay the same amount to see Jayson Nix.

The Daily Yankeeland - 5/15

WhoaWoe is us...seats have begun to be removed from the old Stadium. It's even difficult to say old and stadium in the same sentence (notice the case change too). WCBS radio's Tom Kaminski has added new pics of the deconstruction

The people have spoken...and won. Complaints about no access to field level areas has actually been heeded by the Yankees. After Lonn Trost's elitist statements of the other day, the Yankees have changed their policy regarding access to field areas. Autographs seekers are still screwed though unless they can get a player to the outfield fences.

Jim Leyritz has been released from the psychiatric unit of a Florida hospital.

Tyler Kepner of the Times has a nice feature on Yankees rookie catcher Francisco Cervelli.

The Metro North Station by the new Stadium is finally ready to open (kudos to my boy at Scott Proctor's Arm).

Yesterday, May 14, was the 13th anniversary of Doc Gooden's no-hitter vs. the Seattle Mariners. Sunday will be 10 years since David Wells' perfect game against the same Minnesota Twins.

Phil Coke is expected to be available for tonight's game after sitting out the last couple with an aching back.

Video Tour of Yankee Stadium

Members of the media took a tour of the new Yankee Stadium yesterday. Here's some video from NJ.com.

Touring the new Yankee Stadium with Lonn Trost

Yankees Not Banking on it

Anthony Reiber of Newsday is reporting that sponsorship talks between the Yankees and Bank of America have been called off. BofA has been under fire for considering a signage deal with the Yankees, despite being given a $45 billion bail out by the federal government.

Needless to say Bank of America's stock has dropped since then and the economy continues to struggle.

In an interview on WFAN Wednesday, before word of Bank of America's dropping out was first reported on The New York Times' Web site, team chief operating officer Lonn Trost was asked whether the general economic slump had affected the Yankees' ability to sign up advertisers.

"Fortunately, I can say that the economy has not affected our sponsorship one iota," he said.

Pressed by host Mike Francesa, Trost said he was "thrilled" with the Yankees' advertising efforts for the new stadium.

Bank of America could still work a deal with the Yankees to provide ATM's in the new ball park.