Ticket prices for Heat-Knicks series are bonkers expensive

Ticket prices for the unexpected Miami Heat-New York Knicks Eastern Conference semifinals are soaring.

On Ticketmaster as of Thursday morning, the face value available seats in the nosebleeds for Game 1 on Sunday start at $421.

The Knicks, whom ESPN projected in October for a 39-win season, are coming off a 4-1 first-round series win over the Cleveland Cavaliers. Eighth-seeded Miami, meanwhile, stunned top-seeded Milwaukee in five games to advance.

The crowds at Madison Square Garden should be in a frenzy for the renewal of this historic rivalry.

In the 1990s — the era of baggy jeans, Sony Walkman and hard elbows — the teams engaged in arguably the fiercest rivalry of the decade, even if the actual basketball was far from pretty. 

Unfortunately for most fans, tickets for this season's series aren't at 1990s prices.

Floor-level seats on the resale market are already over $7,000 for games in New York. For $10,000, you could be seen in the second row courtside opposite the opposing bench, in the vicinity of famed Knicks fan Spike Lee. 

The insane resale numbers should be expected as MSG has remained a packed house through the good, the bad and the ugly for the Knicks over the past two-plus decades. However, Games 3 and 4 in Kaseya Center in Miami aren't a bargain either.

While the times of those contests have yet to be announced, unobstructed upper-level tickets for Game 3 start at $235 while standing-room only begins at $227. (For Game 4, those seats currently start at $160.)

For Games 3 and 4, the minimum floor-level ticket starts at $400, but many of the available seats are at least double that price. One of the two open seats behind the scorer's table is going for $25K.

Few expected these teams to meet in the playoffs, but ticket sellers in both cities must be salivating at the prospect of a long series.