By Nina Mandell
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — Knicks fans dumped their season tickets at face value — and below — on Friday, a day after LeBron James announced he was heading to Miami instead of Manhattan.
In the days leading up to James' announcement, everything Knicks-related increased in value. Madison Square Garden's stock price went up, and the Knicks pushed season ticket packages based on their off-season hopes. People looking to gamble on those tickets becoming the hottest in town with James on the team roster gobbled them up.
"I can tell you that the trend we’ve seen was a huge spike in interest on July 7 and July 8 before LeBron made his announcement," Glenn Lehrman, spokesman for ticket reselling site StubHub, wrote in an e-mail to DNAinfo, "and a huge dip today following the announcement."
On Craigslist, sellers were auctioning off their tickets at face value or below-market price. While there was an equal number of tickets being offered leading up to the big announcement, the message was very different the morning after.
"The tickets aren't worth that much anymore," sighed Eli Share, a 21-year-old from Great Neck. "It's a secondary market now."
Share said he bought tickets in anticipation of James coming to the Knicks, guessing he could get up to $1,500 a game if James was in a Knicks uniform. Now he said he's willing to part with the tickets for $180 for the top games.
For some ticketbuyers, the drop in demand worked out well.
New Jersey resident Andy Widholm called the Knicks box office to buy season tickets on Tuesday, but wasn't wowed by the available seats. He called back on Thursday and better options had become available, even before word got out that the Knicks weren't getting James.
"There must have been some sort of leak that LeBron wasn't coming to the Knicks," he said. "I got way better seats that were together."
Widholm, who was selling some of his tickets on Craigslist because he couldn't make all the games, still felt his investment was worth it.
"The Knicks will probably acquire someone else," he said. "I'm not that pessimistic on the situation."
