City officials had to watch TV to see the Chargers for free
Matt Potter’s corruption-implying piece in this week’s San Diego Reader begins thus:
“If past behavior is any guide, last weekend’s playoff game between the Chargers and the Tennessee Titans resulted in a full house at the City’s Qualcomm Stadium box, to which each San Diego city council member receives two free tickets.”
Unfortunately for Potter, past behavior is not a guide. First of all, the Chargers won a playoff game, which hasn’t happened in 13 years. Second of all, anyone sitting in the city skybox this past Sunday paid full freight for the privilege. As Chargers spokesman Mark Fabiani explained to me, owning a skybox does not actually give anyone free entry to the game. Typical owners of skyboxes still have to buy tickets to events they attend, in addition to the annual skybox fee. If they don’t buy tickets, the box will remain empty for the event. The Chargers have in past years comped the city for regular season and playoff games (whether it was out of the goodness of their hearts or because they think they must by contract was not clear to me), which is how City Council members and mayors got in trouble. (Though Super Bowl tickets were never free.)
But when playoff times roll around, the NFL (and MLB, for baseball) takes control of the tickets. This year the league reduced the number of comped seats from 1,200 to 500, and the Chargers decided not to give any to the city. City officials can only give out the right to buy tickets to sit in the city box, but they don’t have tickets themselves. Not this year, anyway.
