Did you hear how Cyclone got postseason tix?

[JEA]

I hate to create a new subject for this, but for anyone who hasn't been over to ORG and read the post titled "Castellini on telecast last night," flip to page 4 (http://www.redszone.com/forums/showt...=50552&page=4). Cyclone talks about a season-ticket package he got for the remainder of the 2006 season that guarantees him the opportunity to buy playoff tickets. It's an amazing deal. As he states...

Those flyers read something like this: Buy a pro-rated season ticket plan for the remaining 19 home games to guarantee yourself playoff ticket options.

Then they listed various groups of seats and pricing, ranging from bleacher seats ($152 for one seat) to a couple thousand bucks for diamond seats. View level tickets were the second cheapest at $204.

Wait a second here. Guaranteed playoff ticket options? The last time this team was in the playoffs, I was only 13-years-old, and if they somehow make it this season, I damn well want to be able to get to some games. However, single game playoff tickets may be as difficult to land as single game Opening Day tickets, and I'm not at all interested in dealing with that hassle.

The solution? I'll bite and let the Castellini marketing machine bring me in. If it takes season tickets to guarantee myself playoff tickets, then it's worth considering. And if I can get tickets for 19 games at only $204 in the view level right behind the plate, hey, that's not too bad. I figured I'd go to half those games anyway, why not do it?

That was last week, and that's when I decided to go for it and buy season tickets for the last 19 games, starting with the Pirates series on Friday night. I ended up attending five of the six games on the homestand and saw some nice games, and now instead of feeling as if the Castellini marketing machine took advantage of me in that deal, I feel as if I've taken advantage of their offer more than anything.

Here we are nearing September, and I have a pretty good seat to every remaining regular season home game for only ~$11 per game, and when that invoice shows up in the mail offering playoff tickets, I'll buy as many tickets as I can to every playoff game. If the Reds fail to make the playoffs or fail to play every possible playoff game, no big deal, I'll just use go ahead and flip the money spent on those playoff-games-that-didn't-happen for a mini-season ticket package next season. I'll go to at least 25 games next season; I might as well lock up the tickets in advance and take advantage of the nice little perks that come along with season tickets.

To Cyclone, great post. A lot of people complain about ticket prices being too expensive for ONE game. Yet, you just showed us how someone can attend an entire MONTH of playoff-atmosphere baseball with the opportunity to purchase postseason tickets to every home game -- at face value -- for a little more than the cost of my monthly cable bill.

I just wonder how many scalpers unfortunately picked up on this offer too. A lot of single-game purchasers, I imagine, are going to find out in October that an influx of season ticket packages pretty much cleaned out the team's inventory of playoff tickets. But lucky for you, it's nothing you're going to have to worry about!

(Did you see the other perks you get? http://cincinnati.reds.mlb.com/NASAp...ing/season.jsp. Even 20-game plans can get a parking pass.)

Anyway, how are the seats?

[Cyclone792]

The seats are very nice, especially considering the cost of only $11 per game!

I knew going in that GABP isn't a large seating capacity ballpark, and it's pushing its limits holding much more than about 42k or so. The Reds rep I talked with stated that they're not likely to sell playoff tickets at the ticket offices; it will all be done via phone and Internet, and I wasn't interested in fighting that fight.

As far as scalpers and the possible markup on individual game seats, I wasn't going to touch that scenario with a 60-foot pole.

Considering that it's been 11 years since the team made the playoffs with really only one season of contention since then, it's probably the best $200 I've spent in a long time.

[Newman4]

I tried to get on there to check it out and it says season tickets are no longer available.

[Cyclone792]

According to the Reds rep I spoke with, the final day to purchase season tickets was apparently Wednesday, August 16th. I lucked out by finding out about the deal just days before the 16th.

[Puffy]

Did you hear how Cyclone got postseason tix?

He slept with Bob Castellini?

He pretended to like RFS, and then AARP got him the tickets?

He beat Lardass Hogan in a Pie Eating contest?

He saw Rosie O'Donnell naked and didn't puke?

[guttle11]

He beat Lardass Hogan in a Pie Eating contest?

That never happened. Hogan whined that he wouldn't be able to get his win back, and said "Brother" a lot. He also mentioned bodyslamming Andre the Giant and the Big Show simultaneously in front of 1,342,432,961 people at the Silverdome. To cap it off, the Iron Sheik threatened to "humble" him, whatever that means...

Then Cyclone said something about "losing his smile" and "took his ball and went home."

The moral of the story, no one goes over on the Hulk, dude.

(Man, I'm a dork)

[Puffy]

That never happened. Hogan whined that he wouldn't be able to get his win back, and said "Brother" a lot. He also mentioned bodyslamming Andre the Giant and the Big Show simultaneously in front of 1,342,432,961 people at the Silverdome. To cap it off, the Iron Sheik threatened to "humble" him, whatever that means...

Then Cyclone said something about "losing his smile" and "took his ball and went home."

The moral of the story, no one goes over on the Hulk, dude.

(Man, I'm a dork)

Wrong Hogan - Lardass Hogan was from Stand by Me (hence the pie eating reference)

[savafan]

Wrong Hogan - Lardass Hogan was from Stand by Me (hence the pie eating reference)

I got it.

Man, I couldn't even watch that scene for years without puking. That's worth a chance at playoff tickets!

[Roy Tucker]

IIRC (its been a while since the Reds have been in the playoffs), if you have season tickets and want post-season tickets, you have to fork up the $$$ for all possible playoff (DS, NLCS, and WS) games. Our package is 4 seats. So it can be a chunk o' money to front the Reds.

I do remember holding and looking at the World Series game 7 tickets in 1995 and dreaming.

[TOBTTReds]

IIRC (its been a while since the Reds have been in the playoffs), if you have season tickets and want post-season tickets, you have to fork up the $$$ for all possible playoff (DS, NLCS, and WS) games. Our package is 4 seats. So it can be a chunk o' money to front the Reds.

I do remember holding and looking at the World Series game 7 tickets in 1995 and dreaming.

If you buy all the games, you can probably sell the games you dont go to, to make up some of the money you spent on the game you are going to.

[johngalt]

That never happened. Hogan whined that he wouldn't be able to get his win back, and said "Brother" a lot. He also mentioned bodyslamming Andre the Giant and the Big Show simultaneously in front of 1,342,432,961 people at the Silverdome. To cap it off, the Iron Sheik threatened to "humble" him, whatever that means...

Then Cyclone said something about "losing his smile" and "took his ball and went home."

The moral of the story, no one goes over on the Hulk, dude.

(Man, I'm a dork)

The pie-eating contest must have been a Dusty Finish, with Hogan getting a rematch the next night to set the record straight.

Either that, or he promised to do the job in exchange for getting his heat back at a big house down the line.