With the NFL season set to kick off in mere hours, Vivid Seats has released data on which teams are the best and worst road draws–in terms of ticket prices–for the 2013 season. The Broncos come out on top, increasing ticket prices by an average of 53.7 percent when on the road. While Denver has above average ticket prices in all of its away games, the grand return of Peyton Manning to Indianapolis is selling at 175 percent over Colts' average price. All the teams' averages are listed above; here are the five games with the biggest price bumps.
- Broncos at Colts: +175.2%
- Cowboys at Chiefs: +101.1%
- Cowboys at Chargers: +95.7%
- 49ers at Seahawks: +93.0%
- Falcons at Bills: +91.7%
The Jaguars, meanwhile, are knocking at least 20 percent off ticket prices in every away game they have. (Of course they are.) Here are the five games with the biggest price drop:
- Rams at Cowboys: -46.1%
- Browns at Vikings: -40.2%
- Panthers at Vikings: -38.0%
- Jaguars at Rams: -36.5%
- TIE: Jaguars at Browns AND Cardinals at 49ers: -34.2%
There's a pretty clear general trend here: People want to see good teams (and the Cowboys) instead of bad teams. Below, I plotted each team's 2012 record against their 2013 away game price bump, which splits the teams neatly into four quadrants of good teams (at least 10-6) that people give a shit about, bad teams that people give a shit about, bad teams that nobody gives a shit about, and good teams that nobody gives a shit about. Here they are:
Not a lot of faith in last year's surprising wild cards, all of which fall into the "good teams nobody gives a shit about camp," along with the Texans. Insufferable fans of the Cowboys, Saints, Steelers, Giants, and Eagles (and their equally insufferable enemies) are driving up the price of tickets to see them, even though they were middling in 2012.
Not a lot of surprises in that group in the lower left, which performed poorly in 2012 AND has a negative impact on sales in 2013. Will one of them break out and become this year's Vikings or Colts ? Maybe. Will it make a big impact on next year's ticket prices? Doesn't look like it.