The draw of LeBron James, Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving has created such a high demand for tickets that the Cleveland Cavaliers must now use a lottery system to sell single-game tickets.
The offseason additions of James and Love, along with the title aspirations that came with them, has Cleveland fans clamoring for tickets. Unable to seat everybody, the Cavaliers announced on Friday they would use a lottery system to sell single-game tickets.
"There was an internal desire to make sure we could get as many different fans in to see our games as possible," Cavaliers CEO Len Komoroski said, via ESPN. "These fans have been with us for the good times and the bad and we want the tickets in their hands instead of the brokers, who are going to buy them with the intention of taking them, reposting them and selling them for profit."
The lottery system will consist of randomly drawing names from a list of fans wanting tickets. ESPN's Darren Rovell explained in greater detail:
"On Sept. 26, the team will start taking names from fans who want to be entered into the lottery. The Cavaliers say they have set aside about 50,000 tickets to sell on a single-game basis, meaning they'll release roughly 1,200 per game to the lottery.
"During the first week of each month, fans whose names come up will have 12 hours to choose which game during the next month they want to attend. Each winning fan will be able to purchase up to six tickets. The price of tickets is variable depending on the opponent, but team officials said the average price of this season's tickets matches the average price of the top tier of seats from last season.
"Fans who win the chance to buy tickets and purchase them are not eligible to participate in the lottery for the two months following."
Cleveland became the favorite to win the Eastern Conference as soon as Love signed in August.
*Headline updated to correct typo.
