Tapped Out: Alabama football games have become largely unaffordable to most people

Photo by Butch Dill/Getty Images

It has been a while since we have checked in on the rapacious pricing of Alabama football games. And despite the Tide’s more modest success of late, and Greg Byrne outsourcing everything for a quick buck, the costs have not grown more forgiving. No, in fact, Alabama had the second highest rise in cost of attendance this year.

And, across all tiers of service, attendance at an Alabama game is now the second most expensive college football environment in the country, behind only Colorado.

• Average college gameday cost: $184.67 for 2 people (+2.7% YoY)
• Most expensive: Colorado ($302), Alabama ($295) and Texas ($292).

In the case

of the Crimson Tide, real pricing rose 17.6% between 2023 and 2024. And in year over year costs, attendance at an Alabama game costs 60% more now than it did in just five years ago.

But even that quoted figure of $295 per person greatly undersells the expense — that is only the face value of tickets, school-supplied parking, a soda and a hotdog.

In real dollars, of course, you can almosy certainly double that for an SEC game or OOC opponent of note.

If you do not have season tickets, you can bank on spending $400 to literally thousands for a pair of seats at a game in Bryant Denny.

And, no, you probably can’t afford even nosebleed season tickets now either, with the Crimson Tide also having the second most expensive ones in the country.

Season tickets in the upper deck of the South end zone will probably run you and the Missus $4000+ a year.

The median household income in the United States is $61,197…gross. And, in Alabama, it far lower: $52,095. Now, perhaps you are in a financial position where season tickets will not work a financial hardship. But most people do not have the luxury of tossing 5, 10% or more of their entire annual wealth on just seats.

Thinking about going a cheaper route, maybe catching an Alabama basketball game? Single tickets there are every bit as expensive as football now — and then some.

What about Fan Day / Running of the Gumps? Hold onto into your wallet, because Alabama has its hand out for that one too.

As you know, once prices go up, they never lower again. Priced out, tapped out, the turnip bled dry, that is the new status quo.

But when university administrators pass the hat three or four times a year, citing urgent financial need, they are going to find increasingly reticent donors — and too many families who know that it is the trip of a lifetime now just to attend a game at a taxpayer funded state university.

Greed killed this golden goose, and it will erode (if not destroy) the once-middle class right of passage, where families passed their love of the game onto their children.

Enjoy your LED light shows and million dollar administrator salaries. Nothing is ever sacred when you view something larger than yourself as a mere business — it all becomes profane.

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