It's tough to sell single-game Toronto Blue Jays tickets in the month of April, what with the Maple Leafs annual drive to the Stanley Cup and all the parade planning that entails. So the Blue Jays have decided to see if baseball fans in Detroit and Boston are interested in making a road trip here to see the Tigers and Red Sox play at the Rogers Centre. Initial indications are that they might be.
The Blue Jays received permission from Major League Baseball Advanced Media to receive access to the site's consumer information base, and have e-mailed fans of the Tigers and Red Sox offering them tickets to games at the Rogers Centre on April 4-6 (Red Sox) and April 18-21 (Tigers) before they go on sale to the general public in Toronto.
According to Blue Jays president Paul Godfrey, the club sold $10,000 worth of tickets to the Tigers series by the end of the business day on Thursday, the first day the tickets were made available. The club had no report on sales in Boston.
"It's off to a reasonable start," said Godfrey, who admitted he was sensitive to the idea that fans in other cities were getting the first choice of tickets to single games and who said the team was closely monitoring the response before it decides to pursue the plan any further.
The Blue Jays will not put individual game tickets on sale in Toronto until March 2.
"We can control the flow of tickets, so if the sales get really hot we can simply shut them down," Godfrey said. "We don't want any surprises for our fans.
"April is usually a tough month to sell tickets, and this is a good thing from the point of view of tourism, too. It's business for the hotels."
Red Sox's tickets haven't been attainable at face value for years, and the Tigers had to cap season ticket sales this winter.
