Finally — and note it is coming from a reporter relatively new to Charlotte — the Uptown paper of record documents that Bobcat ticket prices are seriously out of whack. Of course, this is what Charlotte basketball fans said the minute pricing for the new Uptown arena was announced almost three years ago.

Fans who had ticket packages in the new, old Coliseum for the first Bobcat season were shocked when they saw what the prices would be in the new building for similar seats. Just wait ’til you see the new $265 million building, Charlotte was told — you’ll gladly pay more. Didn’t happen.

The good seat aspect is the key to Steve Harrison’s story — the truth is that a real basketball fan’s seat in Bobcat arena is wildly expensive, and that price point trickles to the rest of the seats in the lower bowl. The very fan base the Bobcats should go after — hardcore hoops nut — is instead priced out of the building and back to the widescreen at home.

The NBA league office has been very involved in helping to set those high prices and even now the Bobcat front-office is heavy with former minions of David Stern, so this is no random mistake. The Bobcats were conceived and marketed as a premium-priced brand for a corporate, expense-account audience. Trouble is, you cannot sell 17,000 seats, 41 times a year that way. Not in Charlotte.

So now we have more talk of lower prices next year, which is what we heard last year before the Bobcats lowered some seat prices while raising others.

As we’ve said before, the clock is ticking on this joint venture between the city and Bob Johnson. Either the sales side gets fixed — and soon — or this whole thing goes boom.