Average Dodger Ticket to Top $20

After one of the poorest seasons in franchise history, the Dodgers have introduced season tickets for $3 a game but raised the prices of other tickets by as much as 30%.

For the first time, the average ticket price will top $20. The average price, listed at $18.94 last season, will increase 6% to 7%, Chief Operating Officer Marty Greenspun said Wednesday, thus rising to $20.08 to $20.27.

The Angels this month announced an 11% increase, to $19.23. The average major league ticket last season cost $21.17, according to Team Marketing Report.

The Dodgers have added $3 season seats in the top deck and, if purchased on a two-for-one basis, $5 season seats on the reserved level and $8 on the loge level.

“It’s all about affordability for our fans,” Greenspun said. “We’re focused on offering value.”

The Dodgers have frozen prices in some sections and increased others, some significantly. The price hikes range from $2 to $5 a game on season tickets and from $2 to $10 on single-game tickets. The cost of field box seats -- outside the baselines -- jumped 30%, up from $17 to $22 on a season basis and $23 to $30 for single games.

Pavilion seats for single games rose from $6 to $8.

The Dodgers lost 91 games last season, a performance owner Frank McCourt said “embarrassed” him. But the Dodgers led the National League by selling 3.6 million tickets, and President Jamie McCourt has said the team broke even.

The player payroll dropped to about $90 million last season, and one source familiar with the organization said Frank McCourt had told him the target for next season is $75 million. McCourt and Ned Colletti, the new general manager, have refused to disclose a payroll figure in interviews but have said the Dodgers will spend what it takes to win.

When Fox sold the team to McCourt in 2004, the corporation sweetened the deal by including subsidies of $35 million that season and $15 million last season. Greenspun said the ticket price increases were unrelated to the end of the subsidies.

-- Bill Shaikin

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Dodger outfielder Jayson Werth, who sat out the first seven weeks of last season because of a fractured left wrist, underwent surgery on the same wrist last week, according to a team spokesperson.

The arthroscopic surgery, first reported by MLB.com, was to repair a torn ligament.

Werth, who batted .234 and struck out 114 times in 337 at-bats, could miss the early part of spring training.

The cost-cutting Florida Marlins finalized their trade with the Mets that sent slugger Carlos Delgado to New York for first baseman Mike Jacobs and two minor leaguers.

The Mets will also receive $7 million from the Marlins to help cover the $48 million Delgado is owed over the next three seasons.

The Marlins also completed a trade that sends ace Josh Beckett, third baseman Mike Lowell and reliever Guillermo Mota to Boston for four prospects.

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GOLF

Wie Struggles to a 75 and Fails to Make Cut

Michelle Wie failed in an attempt to make the cut at a men’s tournament in Kochi, Japan.

Wie, 16, shot a three-over 75 today at the Casio World Open and was four-over 148 for two rounds, missing the cut by a shot. The top 60 players in the $1.7-million Japanese tour event advanced.

Robert Allenby fired a course-record nine-under 63 to take a one-shot lead after the first round of the Australian Open at Moonah Links near Melbourne.

Allenby, a four-time winner on the U.S. PGA Tour, has a one-shot lead over Spencer Levin.

World No. 8 Adam Scott was three shots back alongside Geoff Ogilvy.

Peter Lonard’s bid for a third consecutive Australian Open title was hampered by a 74.

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MISCELLANY

Pound Says the NHL Has a Drug Problem

Dick Pound, the president of the World Anti-Doping Agency, said he suspects as many as a third of the NHL’s 700 players may take some form of performance-enhancing substances.

“I spoke with Gary [NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman] and he said, ‘We don’t have the problem in hockey,’ ” Pound told the London (Ontario) Free Press. “I told him he does. You wouldn’t be far wrong if you said a third.”

Asked if he meant performing-enhancing drugs, the Montreal lawyer replied, “Yes.”

NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly took exception to Pound’s comments.

“I would respectfully suggest that Mr. Pound’s comments have absolutely no basis in fact,” Daly told the Canadian Press. “I find it troubling, to say the least, that he would find it necessary to comment on something he has absolutely no knowledge of.”

Damon Allen, the former Cal State Fullerton standout and brother of NFL Hall of Famer Marcus Allen, was named the Canadian Football League’s outstanding player.

Allen, 42, helped lead Toronto to an 11-7 record, passing for a career-high 5,082 yards with 33 touchdowns.

Soccer great George Best’s condition has deteriorated and he is unlikely to survive another 24 hours, his doctor in London said.

The 59-year-old former Manchester United star, who needed a liver transplant three years ago after decades of alcohol abuse, has been in critical condition in intensive care for a week.

Hiroyuki Tomita became the first Japanese in 31 years to win an all-around gymnastics title at the world championships in Melbourne, Australia. Hisashi Mizutori of Japan took the silver and Denis Savenkov of Belarus won the bronze.

The top American was U.S. national champion Todd Thornton in 20th place.