LAS VEGAS ? Tickets to this ?Dream Match? aren?t really sold out.
In fact, ticket prices in the black market have gone way below expectations, a direct result of the current economic shakedown in the US. Some holders who bought more than what they really needed are now paying dearly for it.
Tickets to tomorrow?s fight, the lowest at $150 and the highest at $1,500, were reportedly sold out just hours after the booths opened more than a month ago. Only 500 tickets for the 16,000 seats were made available to the public.
?But most of these tickets went to scalpers and now they?re having problems selling them,? said a Pinoy banker, who flew in from Manila to see the fight. A regular customer at the MGM, he got himself a $1,500 ticket ? for free.
?They?re (MGM) giving it away to their patrons, and what I heard is that there are more tickets to be given away in the next two days. They didn?t really sell out,? he said.
Manny Pacquiao alone bought tickets worth $70,000 (roughly P3.5 million) for his family and friends. It?s quite a fortune, but actually just a drop in the bucket to his guaranteed purse of $11 million.
?It?s just my way of sharing my blessings,? he said Thursday evening.
Tickets to the VIP section or the television row are being sold at eBay from $2,000 to $4,000 when some people expected them to sell, by this time, as high as $30,000, like in some of the biggest fights of Mike Tyson.
The Los Angeles Times wrote that a Filipino businessman, who wasn?t named, ?deceived (Bob) Arum by telling him he needed to buy a couple hundred tickets? after identifying himself as ?someone affiliated? with Pacquiao.
The report said the man told Top Rank president he needed the tickets as part of a travel package for Filipinos coming all the way from Manila to see the fight, and that Arum later found out that the plan was to scalp the tickets.
?They lied to me, and now they?re paying for it. The economy went so south they?re lucky to sell them at face prices, and most are going at below face value. That was wrong, and they?ve complained to me about losing money.
?I told ?em, ?You win some, you lose some,?? Arum told the LA Times.
