This is a joke, right?

I received an e-mail from someone in the Phillies Sales Department yesterday informing me that the cost of my partial season ticket package would be increasing -- from $20.00 per ticket to $27.50 per ticket. When I first read it, I didn't really think much of it. I forwarded the note along to my brother -- with whom I share the seats -- and then went to bed. With a bunch of other things on my mind, I can't say I thought much about it when I woke this morning, either. Then I came in to work and talked to my brother. He was . . . a little salty, shall I say? The more I'm think about it, the more it bothers me, too. Here's a team that hasn't made the playoffs in eleven seasons, a team that has publicly announced they will be decreasing their payroll this season, a team that did not pay for a good chunk of the new ballpark that they own, a team that is the very definition of the word futile . . . and they tell me that I have to pay almost 40% more for the same product?! Tom's conclusion is dead on -- it's a wonder this team has won even one World Series.