DALLAS. With skyrocketing player salaries and rising materials costs undermining their ability to build state-of-the stadiums, owners of professional sports teams find themselves between a rock and a hard place these days. "It used to be we could look to the state or the city for a little something to cover infrastructure," says Cowboys' owner Jerry Jones. "Now they tell us they've gone and blown all their money on stupid stuff like schools, firemen and policemen, and we're left high and dry."
Texas Stadium: "Hey--I was sitting there!"
So Jones, who had already imposed "personal seat licenses" on long-time fans which, for as much as $150,000, merely give them the right to buy season tickets, came up with the idea of the "personal butt license" to cover his funding gap. "The seat license gives you the right to buy the ticket to the seat," says Martin Zimwurtz, an economist who studies professional sports because it's more fun than poverty. "The butt license gives you the right to put your fanny in the seat that is licensed to you."
"Dude--I got a personal body paint license!"
Other teams with new stadiums on the drawing board are looking closely at the Cowboys' move, and considering other add-on fees of their own. "Many of our fans like to touch inappropriate parts of their bodies while the TV cameras are scanning the stands," says New York Giants' co-owner John Mara. "That depresses our advertising revenues, so people are going to have to 'pay to pick' if they want us to win another Super Bowl."
In Arizona, where the football Cardinals just moved into the University of Phoenix and Mel's Weed-Wacker Supply Stadium, patrons can upgrade to body odor-free seats for a one-time Air Wick Room De-odorizer charge.
"A lot of our fans get kinda sweaty on the long walk from the parking lot to their seats, so we're putting six-foot room de-odorizers in designated VIP seating sections," says Arthur Bidwill, Vice President of Nepotism for the team. "The addition of these fine Air Wick products will not interfere with play on the field, where our team always stinks."
Con Chapman is a Boston-area writer. He is the author of "The Year of the Gerbil: How the Yankees Won (and the Red Sox Lost) the Greatest Pennant Race Ever," a history of the 1978 AL East pennant race, and a number of plays, including "Number One Hockey Mom," "Please, Pope," and "What Mickey Belle Isle Told You," a trilogy about hockey (JAC Publishing). His work is available on Amazon Shorts (at 49 cents a dowload), and he writes on sports for Flak Magazine.
