As soon as the results were in, the complaints echoed from near and far.
The new system is incredibly unfair,"" and ""I'm the biggest Badgers fan ever, how could I not get tickets,"" were just a few of the more civil responses to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Athletic Department's changes to its student ticket distribution policies. The policy for non-freshmen was switched from a first come, first serve system to a weighted lottery.
Despite all the anger and grumbling, however, this new system is not that bad and there is really nothing ""unfair"" about it.
It is different because it gives fans less control, but it is just as fair as any other system.
Each class receives 2,000 tickets and the rest were distributed through a lottery which was weighted in favor of those with higher class standing.
Since 19,258 students applied for 13,607 tickets, around 30 percent of students would be upset by the result, no matter what.
Furthermore, the hail of grievances over last year's e-mail snafu was the impetus for this new system after many students did not get e-mail notification of when the tickets would be available.
The logic used by those pining for the old system is that a more fair system allows students to control their own fate and that more passionate fans will therefore get the tickets. This falls into line with the common attitude that getting a ""fair shake"" allows those with the most merit to come out ahead (or in this case, come out to games).
The problem here is that the passion that drives fans to purchase tickets is not a reflection of how they act on game day. If many students forgo that extra beer bong and get to the stadium before kickoff, maybe there would be fewer changes.
Game after game, the student section was half empty for the beginning of the first quarter, even on gamedays with later start times. Was it simply that all the unpassionate fans got tickets in the ""fairer"" system or was the lure of football Saturday festivities more appealing to these fans than the games themselves?
The only arrangement that truly rewarded fans for their passion and determination employed recently in Madison were the men's hockey and basketball seating systems in use before last year. Fans camped out for up to a week in groups, showing a willingness to labor for something they wanted.
The camping, however, was disruptive to the rhythms of the students' lives and was ultimately shelved.
However there are a few other ways to reward passionate Badger fans.
The first would be to disband student tickets all together and have students slide their WisCards to pay for tickets at the gate until the supply was exhausted. The downside for this is that fans might not show up against opponents like the Citadel, causing it to be a hard sell for the athletic department.
A more plausible solution might be one that punishes students who don't show up on time or at all. The ticket bar codes offer a convenient way to track this and could also discourage students from selling tickets for fear that buyers' actions could cost them in the next season's lottery.
As for the current system, it is no less fair that last year's. It rewards seniority and in the future will reward students who consistently apply for the lottery, though that is little consolation for the current crop of outraged students.
Seventy-nine percent of seniors who applied got tickets, 68 percent of juniors and 58 percent of sophomores. These are not bad odds.
Until the fans make a concerted effort to show up to all games on time, they lack much ground to complain about not getting tickets. The new system does little to reward fan's ""passion"" but, as last year showed, beer seemed to trump passion more often than not.
Do you think Ben would be writing a much
different column if he had not gotten tickets? He disagrees but send your thoughts to breiner@wisc.edu.
