Sports

Garden price hike is food for naught

“Know what? I’m up for a good meal and a nice bottle of wine. Whattya say we run over to Madison Square Garden for dinner? Better bring a couple of grand with ya, though, in case there’s a Knicks game.”

The latest ticket whack-up Bump-and-Run Strategy (BS) is to lean on nonsense, to promise the finest in amenities, including food, a convivial pub atmosphere and fine mall shopping. But who asked them?

It’s as if the local ballparks and arenas should be viewed and attended as restaurants and hangouts, as if the games played within are mere throw-ins and sideshows, like a pool table in the back.

In announcing that the prices of Knicks and Rangers tickets had been jacked, on Friday, Garden exec Scott O’Neill said this in a release:

“Our top priority is to create a world-class experience for every person that [sic] visits Madison Square Garden. The Garden transformation will provide our fans with best-in-class service, new amenities and outstanding food and beverage offerings.

“This will be a new state-of-the-art arena with wider concourses, new seats, better sight lines and improved social settings.”

Fine. But what about those who’d like to buy tickets to Knicks or Rangers games to “experience” a good game from a decent seat at a logical price? When did they become the tiny minority?

We’re fed the same lines about Citi Field and new Yankee Stadium and new PSL Stadium, how going to a ballgame is no longer about the game but part of a dining and drinking and destination “experience.”

But who’s getting free food and drinks? Better asked, who won’t be overcharged to eat and drink? And who would show up regardless of whether a ballgame or hockey game were included?

“Waiter, are the oysters in season?”

“Yes, sir, but the Mets are not.”

And who ever had to shell out 25-50 bucks to park at a restaurant or bar?

Knicks ticket holders with seats in the corner behind a basket this season were charged $110 per seat per regular-season game. Next season they’ll be charged close to $300 per, roughly $500 per come the playoffs. And those will be mid-priced seats.

It’s all another Friday afternoon con job. Old trick. Fridays are when corporations release bad news, knowing news agencies gear down over the weekend, and that’s when the Garden sprung this one.

The Garden, Yankees, Mets, Jets and Giants push the outermost limits of affordability then explain that they’re doing it for you, not for them. Yep, you’re gonna love them for it.

Or, as Mets VP Dave Howard two years ago insisted on WFAN, there are no “obstructed view” seats in new, prices-jacked Citi Field, just some seats with “blind spots.”

More ESPN type-of-graphic errors

ESPN’s graphics continue to be special.

Saturday, following Memphis’ one-point win over UTEP, there was this one: “Memphis earns 1st NCAA berth since 2009.”

Has it been that long? (It later was changed to “5th appearance in last 6 years.”)

Friday, during Ohio State’s win over Northwestern, we read that Ohio State’s 58-57 regular-season win at Northwestern was Ohio State’s “smallest victory margin this year.”

Funny, reader Gregory Koch of Storrs, Conn., seems to recall that Ohio State beat Purdue by half a point.

CBS is guilty, too. During UTEP-Memphis, a graphic read, “Memphis is 12-1 in games decided by 5 points or less.” Yet, how many ended with Memphis conceding no-foul layups that turned seven-point wins to five, six to four? How many close games, at the end, weren’t all that close?

*

Figures. Outside of ESPN3, a streaming video site that few viewers have access to, there was no TV of Saturday’s Princeton-Harvard Ivy League playoff game, won by the Tigers at the buzzer, even though the Crimson wore their black uniforms.

*

Quiz: Who has the longest current run as any national league’s or game’s president or commissioner? Answer: Ruth Unger, now in her 30th year as president of the Manhattan-based National Mah Jongg League, and a league worker since 1964.

*

Didn’t matter that Tiger Woods was 11 shots back after three rounds at Doral, or that Dustin Johnson that day shot 65, the big story on Golf Channel’s “Golf Central” Saturday evening was a tortured slo-mo analysis of Woods’ swing.

*

MLB Network, during today’s 6 p.m. edition of “MLB Tonight,” has remarkably clean footage of Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb and Walter Johnson warming up at a 1924 event in Yankee Stadium.

*

Over 150 slam dunks later, exactly who is Blake Griffin glaring at after he’s done? During Clippers-Nets on Friday on YES, who was he so angry with after making an uncontested slam that he’d freeze and give him a hard-guy stare? There was no Nets player in sight. Oh, to the nearest TV camera! Of course.

Coaches guilty on ‘foul’ play

If I were assigned to interview a prospective college or pro basketball coach, here’s the first — and perhaps last — question I’d ask: “You have a three-point lead with 10 seconds left. The other team has the ball. What do you instruct your team to do?”

If the answer isn’t, “Foul the player with the ball before he shoots,” the interview’s over.

UConn’s Jim Calhoun, at the end of regulation of Friday night’s Big East semifinal, became the latest to allow an opponent the opportunity to tie it with a three. Syracuse’s Scoop Jardine was gifted the clean look with 4.5 seconds left. He made it.

Crazy. Before the shot, ESPN’s Sean McDonough, Jay Bilas and Bill Raftery shared the same thought: Calhoun had to order a foul.

Saturday, with UConn in the same situation in the championship game, McDonough explained that Calhoun says he doesn’t foul in such spots “because too many bad things can happen.”

Not if your team is coached correctly. What’s worse than allowing the other team, down three, to tie it near or at the buzzer?

*

There were five people at one time seated on CBS’ college basketball studio set yesterday. Must’ve made anchor Greg Gumbel think he’d been returned to ESPN.