Chicago Cubs Ticket Prices Reach Historical Highs

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Oct 15, 1:31PM EDT

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Let the good times roll in Wrigleyville.

The Chicago Cubs will enter their first National League Championship Series since 2003 and have moved one step closer to vanquishing the Curse of the Billy Goat and fulfilling their Fall Classic prophecy in Back to the Future Part II. The team will travel to either Los Angeles or New York for Game 1 Saturday dependent on the outcome of Thursday’s Game 5 between the Dodgers and Mets.

And while there is a fervor throughout Chicago that hasn’t been matched in more than a decade, secondary market ticket prices are reaching historical highs at Wrigley Field. The Cubs are guaranteed at least two home games in the NLCS, and ticket prices are averaging over $1,300 on the secondary market.

Across Games 3, 4 and a potential Game 5, the average secondary market price for Cubs NLCS tickets is $1357.85. Game 3 will be held
on Tuesday and tickets own a median price of $1,183.84 with a get-in price of $409. The following day welcomes the cheapest game at Wrigley in Game 4, where tickets average $1,075.92 and get-in price is $413. Should the series stretch to a Game 5 Thursday, the average secondary market price for Game 5 Cubs tickets is a whopping $1,434.10. The cheapest ticket available for Game 5 is now $451.

In fact, ticket prices are so expensive in Chicago that the Cubs average NLCS price is exceeding many teams’ World Series average since 2010, when TiqIQ began recording secondary market ticket data. Only five of those 10 teams posted a higher average price, with the 2010 San Francisco Giants leading the way at $1,660.96 over their two games against the Texas Rangers in AT&T Park.

Of course, if the Mets advance to play the Cubs in the NLCS, ticket prices may skyrocket to even greater heights. The Mets are playing in their first postseason since 2006 and have failed to reach the World Series since 2000. Should they inch past the Dodgers tonight, they would own the second most expensive NLCS average at home behind the Cubs. The average secondary market price for Mets NLCS tickets over their potential four games at Citi Field is currently $843.78. Known for their considerably smaller demand on the secondary market, the Dodgers own a $430.37 average across their four possible games at Dodger Stadium.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.