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Not your typical Celtics fan: In the middle of a heated reelection campaign, Boston’s mayor and her husband aren’t rushing to explain how they made thousands reselling Celtics tix

What in the world were they thinking?

That’s the question in the wake of revelations that Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, facing reelection this fall, and her husband, Conor Pewarski, pocketed thousands of dollars from the sale of Celtics season tickets.

The couple reported a gain of $6,600 from the sale of the tickets in 2024, according to the couple’s tax returns, which the mayor’s campaign selectively released to The Boston Globe and Boston Herald.

Let’s assume the season ticket package was for a family of four, the mayor only having given birth a few months ago to her third child.

Doing a little quick math here, that amounts to a markup of anywhere from $40 to more than $160 a seat, depending on how many games are in the package.

Given the mayor and her family likely went to a few of those games - and just didn’t resell all of their season tickets - the per-seat price is likely even higher.

And if it was a smaller package – say 10 or 21 games – then the markups may have been substantially higher yet.

Celtics super fan: Boston Mayor Michelle Wu, Charles Barkley, Gov. Maura Healey, and Shaquille O'Neal

Still, that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the questions here, for there is a long line of fans waiting to buy Celtics season ticket packages.

Did Wu receive any preferential treatment, such as getting moved up the waiting list for tickets, or even a discount?

Photo by Rohan Gangopadhyay on Unsplash

Here’s something to consider: One of the top owners of the Celtics is developer Robert Epstein, whose daughter, Jennifer, is leading the charge on the controversial, $200 million city-backed plan that Wu has tirelessly championed to build a pro soccer stadium and school athletic complex in historic Franklin Park.

Boston taxpayers are footing the bill for roughly half that project, or $100 million.

Contrarian Boston reached out to Wu’s press office at City Hall, her chief of staff, and her campaign spokesperson, but did not receive a response beyond an acknowledgement of our queries.

Wu and her husband reported pre-tax income last year of more than $213,000 from her mayoral salary and those Celtics ticket sales, according to the Globe.

Wu has made a point to contrast her finances with those of Kraft, the son of the billionaire Patriots owner, who, needless to say, has family wealth.

Yet most middle-class families would be lucky to spring for tickets for a single Celtics game, with the outing easily costing a few hundred dollars.

Not sure how many families in devilishly expensive to live in Greater Boston - even those making $213,000 - have the cash on hand to fork over for season tickets.

Body blow: The news business faces a new existential threat, and it’s not Donald Trump

Trump is an easy villain when it comes to the challenges facing the news business, what with his bullying lawsuits and bombastic rhetoric about the press being the “enemy of the people.”

But progressive and even moderate backlash to Trump also drove a huge spike in subscriptions to the Washington Post and New York Times while boosting the ratings of cable news shows.

Rather, the bigger threat, at the moment, comes from Google, a company whose motto once was - but is no longer - “don’t be evil.”