Tuesday, March 13, 2012

2012 Dodgers' Opening Day Ticket Is One For The Scrapbook

I just received my season ticket allotment for the 2012 Dodgers season. And I have to say, the Dodgers absolutely NAILED the Opening Day Ticket this year. It is a thing of beauty. It's absolutely something I'm going to save and hold onto dearly. And I give the Dodgers' front office a lot of props for doing something special for this, the fiftieth anniversary of Dodger Stadium.

First, let's take a look at the Opening Day ticket from the 1962 season, Dodger stadium's first (courtesy of Lasorda's Lair):

Note the retro font, the shaped top of the ticket outlining the stadium, and of course the price of the ticket: $3.50!

Of course, this is the 50th anniversary season, a holiday worthy of celebration and extra promotional goodness throughout the year. Even still, I was literally blown away to find this Opening Day 2012 ticket in my set of season tickets (blue rectangles mine, to conceal the seat number as well as the bar code):

First of all, I love how they mimicked the 1962 ticket, down to the shaped top of the ticket stub and the little "GRAND OPENING" box in red. I also love the fact they used a retro font again. And this is the best part--the ticket is printed on high-quality glossy plastic, rather than the normal perforated cardstock. It's weighty. It's beautiful.

It's going to be an awesome Opening Day 2012, no matter what. Yeah, sure, the price has gone up a bit in 50 years. But after missing last year's Opening Day for the first time in years, I'm TOTALLY psyched to be going back to the Stadium for another Opening Day this year.

And this awesome ticket just got me even more fired up.

(I just hope the gate attendants don't do something stupid like punch a hole in it upon entrance, or deface it with a sharpie at the gate!)

Notes from trolling ebay: apparently, the Dodgers have issued a similar 1962-styled Opening Day ticket during 2002, to commemorate Dodger Stadium's 40th anniversary. But this card (which looks exactly like the 1962 Opening Day ticket on the front) appears to not be a ticket for stadium admission, but rather a facsimile coupon that was handed out upon entry. The back of the facsimile ticket has these cheesy offers for other memorabilia:

Here's an Opening Day 1962 ticket stub for the reserve level: $1.50 admission. Wow.

6 comments:

Fred's Brim said...

man-oh-man - you can't even get into minor league baseball games for those prices. You have to find special dollar nights to do that

Oh and fuck the '62 Reds and Gnats

Steve Sax said...

I'm okay with the $115 price for this bad boy ticket. When I saw it, I felt like Charlie Bucket.

Hideo Nomo said...

That's beeyoooteeful.

Fred's Brim said...

It is definitely awesome. Do you think all opening day tickets are like that? Or do they need to be from a season ticket package/from certain sections?

Alex said...

^ It's just tickets from season ticket packages -- just got off the horn with Dodger Fan Services, bummer. On the bright side, my opening day tickets came yesterday!!!

Steve Sax said...

I'm blessed. And I'm really psyched for this ticket.