This should make 7,000 loyal Seattle Seahawks ticket buyers feel like they scored a touchdown, but 39,000 other regulars will want to crunch me behind the line of scrimmage.
The team could make the Super Bowl, and it will get an undetermined number of tickets. The head office said the opportunity to buy those seats will go to the 46,000 season ticketholders in a drawing.
But here is the key number: Among the 46,000, there are 7,000 charter season ticketholders who have been there for all 29 years, through the grim times with Tom Flores, Kelly Stouffer and The Boz. Among them is my husband, Chuck.
I say that when the Super Bowl tickets are dished out, the 7,000 charter ticketholders should be the only ones in the pool.
Is that fair?
Believe me, there will be no “fair” in getting a Super Bowl ticket. Right now, an upper end zone seat is going for $2,100 on the Internet. There will be scalping, negotiating, groveling, arm twisting – any number of ploys for Seattle fans who want to be at the big daddy final.
It’s my husband’s lifetime dream. We don’t have the money to send him, but this could be a $5,000 MasterCard moment.
That’s a year of community college for our granddaughter, but let her get a scholarship. This is the Super Bowl. For Chuck and other fans from Alaska to Idaho, going to the Seahawks’ first Super Bowl is the biggest deal in the world.
Surely the Seahawks will like my idea. They listened 27 years ago when I wrote a snippy letter to the editor saying I abhorred a practice of the cheerleaders. I said they should not line up and wave their pompoms in front of the opposing team’s tunnel when the players took to the Kingdome field.
After my letter was printed, the ladies never lined up for the opposing team again.
If only I could swing Super Bowl seats online, but it’s too scary. Who do you trust to sell you actual game tickets? What if you get to the stadium and you bought into a scam? What if you pay thousands of dollars for a hotel package without even airfare included, and the team doesn’t make the big game? Will you get a refund?
For $3,500, Chuck could get a package and share a bed with his 6-foot 5-inch son. That would be a long three nights.
We found a Web site that guarantees you the opportunity, for $375, to buy a ticket, but is it legit? Tickets often aren’t delivered until the day before the game, and they’re sent to your Detroit hotel. If the Hawks aren’t there, how would we resell those seats from Mill Creek?
Hopefully, relatives will give Chuck and our son, or a friend, a free place to stay. Hotels seem to have more than doubled their normal rates for that February weekend. There’s no telling what it will cost to rent a car.
Jeff “The Fish” Aaron at KRKO (1380 AM) has attended nine Super Bowls. He said if a new market, such as Seattle, earns a berth, stand back – there will be a frenzy for tickets to Detroit, he said. His station purchased a package a year ago that a lucky listener will win. He has seen travelers get to Super Bowl venues and not be able to find a ticket to get inside. Aaron said he knows of two promised Super Bowl tickets that already have sold for $3,700.
He understands fan fever.
“When you walk into the stadium and flash bulbs are going off, it gives you chills,” he said. “It’s an amazing event, a feeling that never gets old.”
I want my partner to feel that amazement once in his life. I’ll move mountains to make that happen.
Not a Rolling Stones fan, Chuck probably will go out and buy a beer at halftime. Bud Lite will probably sell for what, $75 a cup? But to him, it will be worth every dime.
If only he gets a ticket.
Columnist Kristi O’Harran: 425-339-3451 or oharran@ heraldnet.com.
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