Yankees Slash Luxury Ticket Prices to Fill Empty Seats

The New York Yankees are cutting top-end ticket prices up to 50% after the best seats in the team's new stadium proved too pricey even for big spenders, AP reports. The team hopes the reductions—on seats costing up to $2500 for front-row seats near home plate—will fill the empty seats that have been an embarrassment at home games. Hundreds of premium season spots have not been sold.

The move has angered some customers who already hold luxury tickets and are being offered extra free seats instead of partial refunds. Critic complain that the new discounted seats are hardy a steal, and that the public is being shut out of their stadium by high prices. "It's the public that built Yankee Stadium, and even at these prices, the public has been excluded from the very stadium they built," said one state assemblyman. "It's a continuing disaster." (More New York Yankees stories.)