OMAHA, Neb. (KMTV) — As the College World Series heads in to its final weekend of action, the idea of taking the family out to the ball game looking less appealing for those around Omaha.
"Some people are starting to get baseballed out," said Chad Carr, president of Ticket Express in Omaha. "We've probably seen some more reasonable prices for the weekday games both in the afternoon and evening than we've seen in year's past."
While mid-week games saw lower attendance, Carr said CWS demand as a whole has been strong.
"We're still seeing really strong demand for the field this year because there's been some unique storylines," Carr said. "Mike Martin's last game, Michigan is kind of the unexpected team in the field."
With half the team's gone it means that less fans from out of town are purchasing tickets. However Carr said the trend used to be fans came to only the early round games and then lost interest but that has changed over the last few years.
"Now we've seen a trend the past few years where some people will stay home the first weekend and wants to see how their team does but if they make the championship they're going," Carr said.
"There are so many great ways to find tickets that are authentic and official so it's important for fans to be aware of where they are buying their tickets from," said Anne Clendenin, a marketing and fan communication official for the NCAA. Clendenin stressed fans should purchase tickets through vendors such as the NCAA Ticket Exchange so fans don't have to worry about getting a fake ticket.
"They can go and you can find tickets for all games, you know it's authentic and you know you won't have any issues," Clendenin said.
But how do fans spot a scalped ticket? Unfortunately it's almost impossible to tell.
"The quick answer is you can not," Carr said. "Basically all tickets are bar-coded."
"For us it's looking at the paper tickets, who provided them, does it look like an official ticket," said Clendenin.
Tickets are still available for the semifinals and championship games. With the marketplace moving to dynamic pricing, fans can still find cheap seats to the biggest games in college baseball.
"If you can go to see a college baseball game at this level for 25 dollars we feel that is a good value," Carr said. "There definitely are some good bargains out there."
