The return of LeBron James has made the Cleveland Cavaliers the hottest ticket in the NBA, by far. According to data gathered by ticket search engine SeatGeek, the average resale price for Cavaliers home games this season is $280.62, the most in the NBA. The second most expensive team, the New York Knicks, cost 60 percent less at an average of $115.77 per ticket. Here is the full list:
Last year the Cavaliers ranked 18th out the NBA’s 30 teams at $82.17, about right for a franchise with the 22nd-best record playing in the 19th-largest (PDF) media market. The 242 percent increase this year is by far the most dramatic rise in the league:
While the LeBron effect for Cleveland at large is hard to capture since spending could simply be moving from other entertainment options in the area, his influence on the ticket market is easy to see. When he left Cleveland for the Miami Heat in 2010, ticket prices there jumped from $57 to $127 per ticket. So far this year, Heat ticket prices are down 25 percent from last year’s average of $155.33 to $116.09. Measured yet another way, all of this season’s top 10 NBA games by average price involve the Cavaliers, with tickets for the Oct. 30 season opener—at home against the Knicks—topping the list at $881.23. And of the 50 toughest games to get into (measured by highest asking price for the cheapest seat), 39 are Cavaliers games.
Numbers like these are yet more reason to suggest that, at $20.7 million for the season, James is underpaid. Cleveland ticket brokers, along with Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, are capturing millions from his presence.
