The next Super Bowl will be played in Atlanta, raising a natural question for many local football fans: Will tickets be available?
Tickets won’t be available in the traditional sense of an open-to-the-general-public sale at face value. The NFL doesn’t do that with Super Bowl tickets.
Tickets will be available at face value to a relatively small number of holders of high-end Falcons season-tickets. Buyers of $45,000 personal seat licenses for the roughly 1,300 club seats around the 50-yard line are guaranteed the right to buy Super Bowl tickets.
For most other folks, the best shot at buying tickets for Super Bowl LIII, to be played Feb. 3, 2019, in Mercedes-Benz Stadium, may be as part of hospitality packages or on the secondary market. Hospitality packages bundle game tickets with access to other events, such as pregame parties, and amenities; the cost generally is considerably higher than the face value of game tickets alone.
The NFL controls Super Bowl tickets and has divvied up the inventory this way in recent seasons: 17.5 percent to each of the participating teams, 5 percent to the host team, 1.2 percent to each of the other 29 teams and 25.2 percent to the league office.
Some tickets eventually find their way to the secondary market, of course. About 48 hours before Super Bowl LII in Minneapolis, StubHub said the average re-sale price on its site for tickets to the game was $5,414 and the lowest was $3,103.
> Click here for full story on Super Bowl tickets -- who gets them and how.
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Mike Soroka's debut topped Ronald Acuna's debut in the Braves' local TV ratings.
Of course, Soroka’s debut had the advantage of also having Acuna in the lineup.
Fox Sports Southeast’s telecast of the Braves’ win over the Mets Tuesday night – Soroka’s first big-league start and win – drew a 3.28 rating in the Atlanta TV market. That was slightly higher than the 3.24 rating for Acuna’s debut April 25 and 32 percent higher than the Braves’ average rating for the season (2.49).
The Acuna and Soroka debuts are two of the Braves’ three highest-rated games this season, trailing only an April 21 game against the Mets (3.4).
> Soroka reflects on a big night for him and for the Braves in this story by David O’Brien.
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TODAY’S LEADOFF LINKS
> The Braves shut out the Mets 7-0 Wednesday night to move into first place in the NL East. See story here and photos here.
> Falcons strong safety Keanu Neal is just fine with the NFL's new tackling rule, D. Orlando Ledbetter reports.
> It took Rory McIlroy some time -- and a few bottles of wine and some prodding by his wife -- to get over his loss at the Masters last month, Chris Vivlamore writes.
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