Long Island's Jets and Giants fans are fed up with trek to games to see losing teams
Steven Berkenfeld, of Melville, has been a Jets season ticket holder since the team moved to New Jersey in 1984 and regularly attended games at Shea Stadium before that.
But when the Jets sent him a bill for $7,200 in November to renew his four-ticket season package for next year, Berkenfeld did something he never thought he would do: He told the Jets he was done.
“You can be a long-suffering Jets fan, but at some point you have to say it’s enough,” the 65-year-old said. “I mean, I’ll watch the games, but I don’t want to go out to the stadium anymore . . . It’s as bad as it gets.”
More and more, Long Island fans of the Jets and Giants are feeling the same.
The Jets haven't reached the playoffs in 14 years and entered the season with high hopes thanks to a healthy future Hall of Fame quarterback in Aaron Rodgers. The team has managed to go just 4-11, firing its head coach and general manager along the way.
The Giants have lost 10 straight games, are 0-8 at home and have the worst record in the NFL at 2-13.
Newsday interviewed more than a dozen season ticket holders and diehard fans on the state of the two local NFL teams. While some are still going to games, others have decided to stay home, citing the disappointing results, the influx of opposing fans at games and the long trek to MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Some season ticket holders, like Berkenfeld, have decided not to renew their plans because of the high price and low resale value on the secondary ticket market.
“When the Giants are winning people call me every week,” Ira Checkla, 66, of Jericho, said of requests to use his season tickets. “This year? It’s almost funny to ask people to come with us to the games. You can hear the smirk over the phone. People say, ‘What, you don’t like us? You’re offering us tickets to the Giants?’ ”
Opposing fans in attendance
Season ticket holders who decide to stay home can try to sell their seats on secondary market sites such as StubHub and TicketMaster, but they often won't get anything close to what they paid.
“I got a buyer for the Seattle game [on Dec. 1],” Berkenfeld said. “Less than half the price of the tickets, but it was a buyer.”
Baltimore Ravens fans cheer on their team during the fourth quarter against the Giants at MetLife Stadium on Dec. 15. Credit: Jim McIsaac
When cheap tickets are available online, it opens the door for fans of the visiting team to populate MetLife Stadium.
When the Jets hosted the Seattle Seahawks earlier this month, there were enough visiting fans for a “Go ’Hawks” chant to ring through the building, The loudest roar that day was for a Seattle touchdown.
“I couldn’t believe how many seats filled up . . . They were all Seahawks fans," said Neil Getter, 69, a Jets season ticket holder from Huntington. "It’s mind-boggling. Absolutely mind-boggling.”
Getter said he looked into selling his tickets but didn't think it was worth it, saying, "You have to go way below face value to sell your seats."
On Dec. 8, the Giants hosted the New Orleans Saints and that morning the price for the cheapest tickets on StubHub was $8. By the time kickoff approached tickets could be had for $1 a piece. Tickets for the Jets’ game Sunday against the Rams were selling for $5 on the morning of the game.
Stacy Lane, of East Rockaway, started going to Jets games four years ago when she started dating George Frouxides, 63, of Farmingdale, who has been a Jets season ticket holder since 1984.
“It’s very depressing,” Lane said of the atmosphere the past few games.
Frouxides said he still isn't sure if he will renew his season tickets for next year, but he put down a deposit just in case.
“It’s so disheartening at this point,” he said. “As a Jets fan my heart is encased in steel, but it’s starting to rust… I feel burned. I feel like I am being used for a money-grab.”
'Looking for reasons not to go'
The NFL bases attendance figures on the number of tickets sold, not the number of fans who actually enter the building.
The Jets and Giants share the league’s largest stadium in terms of seating capacity (82,500) and the vast majority of those tickets are sold to season ticket holders, so the two teams rank second and third in attendance, respectively, in pro football, behind only the 7-8 Dallas Cowboys.
The Jets have averaged 80,361 tickets sold for the team's seven home games in 2024; the Giants 79,373 in eight. Each team has one home game remaining this season. The Cowboys, who sell thousands of standing-room-only tickets to each game, have averaged more per home game this year (93,185 in a stadium that officially seats 80,000).
Empty seats are seen during the third quarter of a game between the Jets and the Seattle Seahawks at MetLife Stadium on Dec. 1. Credit: Jim McIsaac
Both the Giants and Jets declined to comment for this story.
Sunday’s announced attendance of 76,871 was the lowest for a Jets home game this season. There are other signs that indicate actual attendance has waned this season. The parking lots normally packed with tailgaters before games have thinned and large swaths of seats during the contests remain empty.
“There are less people at the games and when you look up at the expensive seats, those 50-yard line seats up in the club section, yeah, they’re empty a lot more often than they would be if the Giants were winning,” Checkla said.
Checkla and his friend Jon Altus, 65, of Hewlett, have a cherished routine for attending games together that includes a pregame tailgate party in the parking lot.
Altus can trace his family’s claim to Giants season tickets back to Yankee Stadium, which the Giants left in 1973. He was at the Giants-Rams playoff game in January 1990 the day after his own wedding, had his daughter move her wedding to August to avoid any potential game conflicts a few years ago, and, as a pulmonary doctor, schedules his hospital rounds and appointments around Giants games.
Yet even he did not go to the past two home games this month against the Saints and Ravens because the Giants were mathematically eliminated from playoff contention.
“It’s like the season is over by Halloween,” Altus said. “It’s so debilitating because you look so forward to these games and get so excited . . . I arrange my schedule and we’re getting going and I’m so excited. And then all of a sudden there’s a game on Sunday and I’m looking for reasons not to go.”
Jets fans in the stands during the second quarter of an NFL game against the Houston Texans on Oct. 31 at MetLife Stadium. Credit: Noah K. Murray
Price to attend
The average cost of attending a Jets game for a family of four is $594.02, according to the 2023 NFL Fan Cost Index, which is published by Team Marketing Report, a Chicago-based sports business firm. The cost index is based on non-premium seats, parking and refreshments. That ranked 22nd of the 32 teams in the NFL.
For the Giants, the cost is $655.06, which is slightly above the league average of $631.63, and ranked 14th in the league.
The average Fan Cost Index for a family of four to attend other sports is $266.58 for Major League Baseball, $462.58 for the NHL and $444.12 for the NBA. Teams in those leagues play many more games per season in much smaller facilities than the NFL.
That index is based on the face value of tickets. As the secondary market for the Giants and Jets drops and seats become available well below those figures, so too does the final cost.
That’s good for bargain-hunters, those who want to attend games on short notice, or go to root for the visiting team, but it’s bad for those who are either selling tickets from their season packages at fractions of what they paid or just eating the cost.
The long trek to MetLife
The biggest obstacle for many Long Islanders is the geography. The drive from Nassau County will likely take just over an hour. From Suffolk, it can approach two hours. The drive home can be nearly an hour longer as weekend travelers who weren’t at the game converge on the choking points at bridges and tunnels.
Public transportation, including New Jersey Transit trains that run directly to MetLife Stadium on game days, are an option but it doesn’t allow fans to tailgate fully. For many, the tailgate party is the most fun and rewarding part of the experience.
And when the teams play home games on Sunday, Monday or Thursday nights, as they have this season, the commute can be more complicated and far worse whether by car or train.
“The way the Giants were playing, plus the schlep to get there, and then when they started messing around with the schedule with games late and at night, it became more and more difficult to get rid of tickets I didn’t want, so I gave them up,” said Steven Rice, 75, of Merrick, a Giants season ticket holder until five years ago.
“If they were in Queens you’d say fine, we’ll go, it’s not that long of a trip, it’s easy to get home, no bridges,” said Berkenfeld, the Jets fan who gave up his tickets. “But that’s a special Long Islander issue."
'There has to be some hope'
Still, there is something to be said for being there and spending time with friends and family. At least when the team is winning. Or not yet losing. That’s why even though they aren’t showing up now, some will be back again next fall.
“I’m a fan,” Altus said. “I lived through the bad times a bunch of times and I lived through the good times. The whole experience is fun . . . I hope my grandkids can start coming. It’s a lot of fun being together and watching the Giants and rooting for them.”
Janet Cabat, 86, of Staten Island, still attends most Jets games with season tickets that have been in her family since 1964. She said she goes to spend time with her son, Josh Cabat, an education professor at Stony Brook University.
“I go because I spend the day with Josh,” she said. “I buy us a couple of frankfurters and a pretzel and that’s lunch and we have the afternoon together.”
“Every year I say to Josh, ‘Do you really want to go back next year?’ ” Cabat said. “He says ‘Yes, mom, it’s our time together.’ So I do it."
Jets fan Steven Berkenfeld, of Melville. Credit: Newsday/Kendall Rodriguez
Berkenfeld, though, will not return.
“It became something we enjoyed less and less,” he said of being a Jets season ticket holder. “We wouldn’t be looking forward to it. The joy was taken out of it and it sort of beats you down. After all these years you go, and for one reason or another you have a disappointing, unpleasant experience.”
He does plan to attend the Jets’ final home game this season against the Dolphins. It may be his last Jets game ever after four decades of steady attendance, but he is not heavy-hearted about the change.
“I think we’re looking at it and saying this is a little bit of liberation,” he said. “It's a feeling like retiring. I’m done with this and I can do what I want to do . . . It became more of a burden than it was something of joy. I’m not sad like this is our last game, but that we’re free of having to always do this.”
He’ll still be a Jets fan even if he isn’t a season ticket holder. That, Berkenfeld said, is something that will never change no matter how poorly the team plays.
“It builds character,” he said of rooting for the Jets. “But you can build character at home in front of the TV instead of going to these games, too.”
THE COST OF SEASON TICKETS
To buy season tickets for the Giants, fans must first purchase a Personal Seat License (PSL), a one-time fee that allows customers to buy tickets for as long as the team plays at MetLife Stadium. According to the Giants website, the cost of a PSL ranges from $1,000 for the upper level to $20,000 for the Coaches Club seats on the 50-yard line.
One season ticket, which includes 10 home games (one preseason and 9 regular season), in the upper level will cost between $950 and $1,200, according to the Giants website. Mezzanine level and lower level tickets cost between $1,300 and $2,250. The Coaches Club, which is on the 50-yard line, cost $7,300 for the season.
The Jets do not require PSLs for seats in the mezzanine and upper deck. The team does not have updated prices for PSLs on its website, but when the stadium first opened in 2010 the prices ranged from $2,500 to $30,000.
The Jets' cheapest upper-level ticket is listed at $690 while the Coaches Club goes for $8,050, according to the Jets' website. Lower-level Jets tickets cost between $1,550 and $2,250. Mezzanine tickets cost between $1,200 and $1,300.
Season ticket holders are required to purchase 10 games each season, a package that alternates between eight regular season games with two preseason games and nine regular season games with one preseason game. Fans will also have to pay for parking, which ranges from $45 to $65 per game.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
