Cubs get court OK on ticket business
Judge says laws weren't broken

By James Janega

November 24, 2003, 11:24 PM CST

A Cook County circuit judge ruled Monday that the Cubs did not break state scalping laws by selling tickets through a brokerage service incorporated by the team's owner.

Reading from her 40-page decision, Judge Sophia H. Hall said evidence presented at a seven-day trial in August by ticket buyers who brought the suit "fails to prove that the business relationship between [the Cubs and the brokerage service] violates any law or violates custom or practice."

But outside Hall's courtroom, attorney Paul M. Bauch, who brought the class-action suit against the Cubs on behalf of ticket buyers, argued that by selling blocks of tickets to Wrigley Field Premium Ticket Services, the Cubs' actions "will mean higher prices and less tickets for fans."

The Cubs countered that tickets given to Premium came from a pool of VIP tickets set aside for sale to players, sponsors and league officials, and they contended Premium marked them up to a lesser extent than is typical in the high-priced secondary ticket market.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs "failed to prove ... [the] Ball Club's sale of tickets to Premium from its discretionary reserves reduced Cubs fans' opportunity to purchase tickets from the box office," Hall wrote.

The Cubs and the ticket service are owned by Tribune Co., which also owns the Chicago Tribune.

After the decision was read, Cubs executive vice president for business operations Mark McGuire said fans benefited from the new ticket brokerage business because it provided "good seats at better prices than they would have had previously."

That sentiment was echoed by James A. Klenk, an attorney who represented the Cubs and the brokerage. "Everybody wins. The fans win on this one," said Klenk. "Fans win because those who purchased in the secondary market have a better source to buy tickets from, at better prices."

In the trial, Bauch characterized the brokerage as a "shell corporation" of the Cubs, a business "alter ego" the team used to artificially raise ticket prices. He also argued that the Cubs established the brokerage to dodge a state scalping law that prohibits owners of amusements, including baseball teams, from selling tickets for more than the listed price.

"Basically, they're promoting tickets at one point and then in effect shorting the market and selling the tickets at a higher price," Bauch charged again Monday.

Bauch said the ruling could lead to sports franchises in other cities to establish their own ticket brokerages.

The suit had sought a halt to operations at Wrigley Field Premium Ticket Services as well as a $100-per-ticket reimbursement paid to fans who bought through the agency.

Hall found that the brokerage and the Cubs had complied with the Illinois Ticket Scalping Act because the brokerage had purchased tickets from the ball team.

During court testimony, McGuire said he started investigating the idea of a separate brokerage in 2001. During that time, McGuire testified, there was some discussion about how such a move could generate bad publicity.

The Cubs organization eventually decided to transfer tickets from the team's pool of VIP tickets. McGuire testified that he instructed Frank Maloney, the Cubs' director of ticket operations, to reduce the size of the pool and sell the difference to Wrigley Field Premium.

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