With the NBA All-Star Weekend taking place in Toronto, those who want to get in on the action can pay as little as $50, or as much as $70,000.
For the actual NBA All-Star Game on Sunday, Feb. 14, however, you’ll probably have to shell out around $1,000 to see the likes of LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry in action. The average resale price on online marketplace SeatGeek, for example, is currently at $1,014, while on Vivid Seats, the median ticket price is higher at $1,378.
According to SeatGeek analyst Chris Leyden, this year’s All-Star Game is actually the eighth most expensive NBA event in the company’s database, behind only four 2015 NBA Finals games, a 2010 Finals game, and the All-Star Games in Los Angeles and New York:
Interestingly, this year’s All-Star Game ticket and the Slam Dunk contest are on track to become the two most expensive events in the Toronto area, Leyden said. In the whole of Canada, the only events that have seen higher prices since 2010 were linked to the nation’s love of ice hockey: Games 5 and 7 of the 2011 Stanley Cup in Vancouver.
But if the get-in prices for the actual game is too prohibitive, fans might want to try the corresponding events. The NBA All-Star Weekend consists of an array of complimentary contests—from the Celebrity Game that will feature actors Kevin Hart and Jason Sudeikis, to the always-popular Slam Dunk Contest—that are much cheaper (although if you elect to sit in a suite, the price will be around $70,203, according to Vivid Seats):
Aside from the sizable population of the Toronto metropolitan area, other factors that have contributed to the ticket’s bottom line has been a surprising lack of inventory. “A lot of people with access to the [All-Star Game] tickets are choosing not to sell them and would rather go,” Leyden told Coins2Day. “There seems to be less inventory than a typical [Toronto] Raptors game or last year’s All-Star Game, and that’s driving up prices.”