Noted

"A $24 ticket bought directly from the Mets costs $37.50." (Phil Mushnick)

"All of the Mets, Yankees and NYC resources could not duplicate what the Romans did 20 centuries ago"

A few excerpts from EV Grieve favorite Phil Mushnick's column in today's Post. The topic: The new stadiums for the Mets and Yankees:

The Mets' new billion-dollar, state-of-the-art, restaurant- and luxury-box-lined park has loads of obstructed-view seats -- same as the Yanks' new park. The Mets are pretending that theirs don't exist, while the Yanks are pretending that theirs were part of the plan, all along.

Who was the architect, George Costanza?

Not that anyone expected anyone to actually consider the sightlines from these seats. Those unwilling or unable to surrender their good senses to continue to attend Yankees and Mets games were deemed persona-get-outta from the start. The plans, after all, always called for fewer "cheaper" seats.

Who knew, three years ago, that such seats would be in demand among the freshly impoverished? Or that corporations, having supplanted real fans as sports' best customers, would be less solvent than both bleacher bums and bleach?

And!

Most remarkable, though, is that in the 21st century, all of the Mets, Yankees and NYC resources could not duplicate what the Romans did 20 centuries ago. The Roman Coliseum, now 2,000 years old, never had a bad seat.

And!

No worries, though. If Mayor Bloomberg and Yankee Vice Emperor Randy Levine are correct in their claim that new ballparks are good for the economy, we can build new ones every two years. Excelsior!

"An irresponsible vanity buy"

Phil Mushnick in the Post today:

Two years ago, when the country's financial health was superficially strong, the Mets-Citigroup naming rights deal -- a record-cracking $20 million for 20 years to call the new ballpark Citi Field -- wasn't just gaudy, it was downright obscene.

Now, with Citi laying off thousands while reaching for billions in government bailout money, and with Citi's clients having taken a brutal beating, the declaration by the two parties that the ballpark naming deal will proceed as agreed upon is nauseating.

Two years ago, the $400 million deal to call the Mets' new stadium Citi Field was nothing better than an irresponsible vanity buy, one rooted less in advertising than in mad money beyond Madison Ave.

Today, that the deal will be sustained is no different than a welfare mother spending her family's subsistence money on booze, bracelets and the down payment on a brand new BMW.

Yankee Stadium: "Priced out of the game"

Post sports radio/TV scribe Phil Mushnick wonders why Yankee Stadium will be demolished after this season:

"It's being destroyed because it, too, has been priced out of the game. It's being knocked down for a new ballpark with fewer but far more expensive seats; eliminated so it can be replaced by a stadium with more luxury boxes and costlier come-ons for corporations and the mindlessly wealthy."

Even rich people can't afford to see the Mets or Yankees next season

Yesterday I mentioned how expensive tickets were to see the Home Run Derby at Yankees Stadium. That should prepare everyone for what will be charged for normal, everyday tickets next season. No surprise, steep ticket prices will be the norm once the Yankees and Mets open their schmancy new stadiums in 2009. In the Post last Friday, EV Grieve favorite Phil Mushnick wrote about a rather wealthy fellow who has been a Mets season ticket-holder since Shea opened in 1964. As Mushnick reported, this man decided he's not renewing his tickets. His four box seats cost him $5,837 in 1993, $11,836 in 1998, $23,702 last year and $33,300 this season. Last week, the Mets informed him that comparable seats next year will cost him roughly $60,000.

Yesterday, Mushnick wrote that his Friday column "led to a pile of missives from Mets and Yankees season and partial season ticket-holders; those who now realize that they, too, have reached the point of can't return.

"Friday, one wrote that he's one in a group of friends who have purchased the same box seats in Yankee Stadium the last 20-plus years. The first year, the seats were $12.50 per. By 1996, they were $25 per. Last year they went to $150 a seat. This year they are $250 a seat. And, he added, the seats have been in disrepair the last three years."


(Sidebar: And, given the insufferable John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman calling games on NewsRadio 880, you can't even listen to the Yankees...And why does Sterling insist on saying "an A-bomb for A-rod" as his signature home run call?)

Still, there are options left for those of us who like watching baseball: For the price of one draft beer at Yankee Stadium, you can get a good ticket to see the Staten Island Yankees. Better scenery along the way too. And, of course, there are the Brooklyn Cyclones and Newark Bears. And Long Island Ducks. And Atlantic City Surf.