LOS ANGELES -- Spending nearly $25,000 for baseball tickets
seemed like a worthy investment to Michael Mahan, considering the
700th home run ball crushed by Barry Bonds will likely fetch a much
higher price.
But it appears Bonds will reach that historic milestone in the
coming days so Mahan, a lifelong Los Angeles Dodgers fan, has been
selling most of those tickets in the right-field pavilion at Dodger
Stadium.
Mahan, 28, decided six months ago to purchase every seat in the
Bonds-friendly section of Dodger Stadium for two of the last three
games against the San Francisco Giants in October. He was hoping
that Bonds would join only Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron in the 700 home
run club.
Mahan has been reselling most of the 6,458 tickets for as much
as $15 each -- much more than the $3.50 the Dodgers front office
gave him as part of a standard group-discount rate.
"An individual found a way to manipulate the system, and it
won't happen again," Gary Miereanu, the Dodgers' vice president of
communications, told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday.
Mahan said he sold tickets through his Web site at $15 each and
said he sold 3,000 tickets to a broker for less than $15 each but
declined to disclose the exact price. He donated 400 tickets to
charity and said he gave about 300 to family and friends.
"I haven't done the numbers. I'm not going to lose money," he
said.
Mahan, an investment banker, has even taken it one step further.
He has required every ticket buyer to sign an eight-page contract
compelling them to hand over to him any Bonds home run ball they
might catch. He would then sell the ball and split the money evenly
with the fan who caught it, according to the contract.
The only people in the right-field pavilion free of legal
constraints at the two games will be Mahan's parents, two sisters
and 8-year-old brother.
"If one of them gets it, I'm just as happy," Mahan said. "I'm
sure they'll want to give it to me."
The Dodgers have threatened to let fans into the right-field
pavilion for free if 20 percent or more of Mahan's seats are
unoccupied on the game days.
"It's irrelevant because they're going to be 100 percent
full," Mahan said.