The Ravens released a new batch of playoff tickets after a first round sold out last weekGETTY IMAGES
Hundreds of tickets for the Ravens' home Wild Card playoff game Sunday against the Chargers are "still available on the team's website," according to Amanda Yeager of the BALTIMORE BUSINESS JOURNAL. That is a stark contrast to six years ago -- the Ravens' last postseason game at M&T Bank Stadium -- when tickets for a Wild Card matchup against the Colts "sold out within 20 minutes." Fans have become "wise to the fact that they can buy tickets up until the last minute." Ravens Senior VP/Ticket Sales & Operations Baker Koppelman: "Games are never really sold out in the traditional sense, because there's always somebody trying to sell a ticket up until kick-off -- and sometimes even after kick-off. There's always going to be secondary inventory available." He said that there were "slightly less than a thousand tickets available," with options "ranging from club seats to the upper level." Koppelman indicated that he "expects ticket sales to pick up as excitement builds for Sunday's game." He said, "The thing that hurts us most on the primary side is just people making assumptions that the tickets are sold out." Yeager noted the Ravens "released a new batch of playoff tickets after a first round sold out last week in the lead-up to the team's last regular-season game" against the Browns (BIZJOURNALS.com, 1/2).
HANDING OVER THE REINS: In Baltimore, Peter Schmuck noted Ravens Assistant GM Eric DeCosta will take over as Exec VP & GM from Ozzie Newsome at the end of this season when he retires, but the "close relationship between the two and the fact that Newsome obviously will remain a presence at the Under Armour Performance Center should tell you that he’ll continue to have an imprint on the team." Ravens coach John Harbaugh: "Sometimes it gets lost that Ozzie is not leaving. He’s not going anywhere. He’s going to be right here with us." Schmuck noted Newsome is "something of a living legend" in Baltimore, which "might make for an awkward situation for the guy who is replacing him." Maybe it "will be at some point, but he and DeCosta have worked so closely together for so long that it should be a comfortable transition for both." That "doesn’t mean that DeCosta won’t have his own philosophy and approach to the job, but there probably won’t be much pressure on him to prove that to anybody because he has long been known as one of the main architects of the team" (BALTIMORE SUN, 1/2).
