Series Ticket Prices Jump For First Dodgers-Yankees Match Since 1981

The price of tickets to the World Series, which starts Friday in Los Angeles, has doubled since last year and quadrupled since 2002.

According to Vivid Seats, the cheapest ticket price for Game 1 at Dodger Stadium is $1,302, increasing to $1,443 for Game 2, also in the home of the National League Champions.

But ticket prices for the next three games – all scheduled for Yankee Stadium – are 40 per cent higher than they are for any of the games in L.A.

The first Fall Classic meeting between the Dodgers and Yankees since 1981 features prospective Most Valuable Players in Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge, a myriad of other All-Stars, and two of the three clubs with payrolls above $300 million.

Roster Resource, which ranks major-league payrolls, places the New York Mets first at $335 million, followed by the Dodgers at $325 million, and the Yankees at $302 million.

The Los Angeles payroll would be significantly higher if Shohei Ohtani, in his first year as the team’s designated hitter, had not agreed to defer all but $2 million per year of the record 10-year, $700 million contract he signed as a free agent last December.

This year’s lowest ticket prices are double the $685 average of the 2023 World Series, which pitted a pair of wild-card teams in the Arizona Diamondbacks and Texas Rangers, and four times higher than the prices of 2022, when the combatants of the final round were the Houston Astros and Philadelphia Phillies, according to ticket re-sale outlet StubHub.

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When the Yankees and Dodgers met in the 1981 World Series, a $20 upper deck seat in Yankee Stadium sold for $80 for the Fall Classic, according to The New York Times.

And in 1949, when the Dodgers were still based in Brooklyn, four World Series tickets could be had for $70-$100, the newspaper reported.

Since that time, baseball economics changed radically.

After labor organizer Marvin Miller took over as executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association in 1966, players achieved huge gains in contract negotiations through binding arbitration and the free agency, allowing athletes to sell themselves to the highest bidder after six years of service to their original teams.

Hank Aaron, the career home run king from 1974-2001, had just $2 in his pocket when he left his Mobile, Ala. home to play for the barnstorming Indianapolis Clowns.

He later signed with the Boston Braves after that team offered him $50 more than the New York Giants.

Aaron’s peak pay was $240,000 – a cool half-million less than today’s minimum salary, which was achieved by collective bargaining between players and owners.