[mcgwirecom]

Good post Scott!

My nephew called me and told me they were doing this. I told him just about word for word what Scott wrote. I know Seattle did it for Nolan Ryan's last game and Detroit did it for Clemens 2nd 20 strikeout game. I was just getting into ticket collecting at that time and bought a bunch. After a while someone had mentioned the date code on the ticket showing they were made after the fact. It really made me mad and opened my eyes. As Scott said, now I just stick to the season ticket. But in 1998 the Cardinals reprinted McGwire's 62nd and 70th homerun SEASON tickets as a gift for season ticket holders. AND THERE S NO WAY TO TELL ITS A REPRINT! I had purchased multiple tickets to all of his September games. Luckily I had sold my extras before the Cardinals sent out the reprints and flooded the market! They also did this in 1999 with his 500th homerun. I am not sure if they did it for Griffeys 500th which happened there.

If you look on Ebay most people just bid on the season tickets. Mostly because they are much nicer looking, but also because people have seen this reprint thing happen! Since the advent of StubHub it shouldn't be so difficult to find nice unused season tickets. A lot of people are now buying up season tickets to re-sell. When you re-sell on StubHub they do not deal with the mailing of tickets. You buy the season ticket, send in the ticket numbers and StubHub disables that ticket so the buyer can print out another new one at home. So the seller can actually make two profits, one from selling the ticket and another from selling the disabled ticket later if it is a significant game. For guys like me who want to go to the game with a season ticket in hand, it makes it tough! I wanted to buy a season ticket to Stephen Strasburg's first MLB game and also attend and I found it pretty hard to do! ( he is supposed to make his 1st start against Pirates next week)