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The other I start thinking about when the weather starts to get a little warmer is baseball. It is only three weeks until my Bowie Baysox start their 20th season in Bowie. Now that my son is away at school, one of the first things that I do when the Baysox release their schedule is to compare their home schedule with his scheduled breaks home. This year, unlike last year, every weekend he comes home the Baysox have games scheduled.
His next break happens to coincide with the opening week of the season. It also happens to coincide with his 18th birthday. The Baysox have a game that day, and one of our friends with the team has arranged to let him throw out a ceremonial first pitch. Naturally for this big event, we want to let our extended family know in case they want to come out to the park to help us celebrate and to cheer on our son as he throws his first pitch.
It was while investigating the schedule and looking for tickets to that game that I discovered a new ticket pricing policy that the team has implemented this season. First, they have raised the price of all tickets by $1 per seat. In these tight times, I am not happy about that, but it is also to be somewhat expected. The price of everything is going up these days.
The other thing that the team did with ticket prices is something I really think is a bad move. In addition to raising the base ticket price by a $1, they have now added a premium of $2 to the price of a ticket if you decide to purchase the ticket the day of the game. So, if you wake up one morning and decide it would be a great day to go to a game, that ticket will cost you $3 more than last year, and $2 more than if you bought the tickets in advance.
I wrote an email to the club to complain about the new policy. The general manager of the team emailed me and gave me a call to discuss different options for our family. That is one of the great things about the team. They really do go out of their way to reach out to the fans. He sent me info about their flex ticket plans that will save us $5-$7 per ticket. Today, I placed my order for a 16 ticket plan for the upcoming season. As we use these, I will probably end up buying a couple of additional plans as needed.
In addition to ordering my tickets, I also took a look at the Baysox upcoming promotional schedule. As usual, there are a lot of great events scheduled, with the best fireworks show in the area. One particular promotion that I am looking forward to is in June for Country Day featuring the Cowboy Monkey Rodeo, where monkeys dressed like cowboys ride dogs like horses. It looks like that will be a fun day to be at the park.
