The Dolphins, who were "once the undisputed kings of South Florida sports, are so desperate these days to sell tickets that they have to go after everyone they possibly can," according to Jason Cole of YAHOO SPORTS. Team management last week “hired a ‘third-party’ company to chase down a couple of hundred season ticketholders who have failed to make payments on their high-end tickets.” Dolphins Senior VP/Public Affairs Adam Grossman said that “this third party is not a collection agency.” But Cole wrote it is “only a step removed.” Grossman in an e-mail wrote, “We enlisted the services of a company that has an accounts receivable recovery module. This is not a collections service. They are a third party that is helping us contact account holders that we (haven’t) been able to reach over the past six months, even though they have received -- on average -- 8 to 10 communications.” Grossman declined to identify the company, but said that it “has no power to impact a person’s credit report or rating, unlike a traditional collection service.” He also said that the team “had yet to decide what it would do if the fans with contracts don’t respond at all.” Cole wrote, “All of that skirts the bigger point. Despite the Dolphins’ long history, the team has progressively lost its foothold on the South Florida market.” The team last year sold 51,069 season tickets. Grossman “wouldn’t say what the team expects to sell this year, but seemed to waver when the 50,000 figure was brought up.” Dolphins Owner Stephen Ross “is seeing the Miami Heat capture the attention of the market.” Cole: “Compared to the Heat, the Dolphins are boring. Not bad, not awful, just boring.” The Dolphins are “dreary and lifeless, sapping the energy from fans faster than South Florida’s brutal August weather.” The product on the field is “simply not good enough,” and that is “one of the reasons the Dolphins have had to put a nightclub at one end of the stadium and sell off shares of the team to the likes of Fergie and Marc Anthony” (SPORTS.YAHOO.com, 8/5).
