If you haven’t already, you’ll probably start soon. Checking out the availability of Red Sox tickets, that is. And boy, are you in for a surprise, because here we are, a week from Opening Day at Fenway Park, and nearly every good seat for each of the Sox’ 81 home games is already gone.

Want to go to a game some weekend? Make your Independence Day weekend plans now, because that’s probably the first weekend that you’ll find tickets available. Against those ferocious Tigers, no less. Yankees tickets? Start lining up for the 2003 season, because they’re long gone — all nine games. Diamondbacks? Nope. Braves? Nada. Mariners? Ha.

Going to Fenway is no longer a spontaneous activity, and it really hasn’t been for a while. This is partly the price of success, and partly the result of the fact that we have the oldest stadium in Major League Baseball — Updike’s lyric little bandbox, which holds just a tad over 34,000. It’s indeed a treasure, but tourists and part-time visitors alike will find out soon that while our little ball yard is still a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon, the least frustrating way to see the Sox this summer may be on TV.

Why? Because the only seats left for the common fan at Fenway are the lousiest ones. Nearly one-third of the 81 home dates are, for all intents and purposes, already sold out, so be prepared to sit in the bleachers or in the God-awful sections in the right-field grandstands, which include sections 1 through 8.

So where are all the good tickets?

One answer is reasonable; the other is frustrating. For the former, we can safely say that the best tickets — the lower box seats in the infield — are in the hands of long-time individual and corporate season-ticket holders. They pay for ’em, they get ’em, which is fair. If you have the connections, perhaps you’ve been in those seats, which offer up the most spectacular view of our ballpark that one could hope for. When you’re in those seats, you don’t want the game to end.

The other cache of tickets is apparently in the hands of the no-goodniks who ply their trade outside Fenway before every home game — the scalpers. The alleged cast of characters who conduct this unseemly ticket-reselling trade, and hints as to their business practices, were introduced to the reading public last week in a splendid exposé by the Boston Herald.

Having worked down the block from Fenway for more than a dozen years, I have often passed these guys as they patrol the area around the park in the hours leading up to game time. For the casual fan who only takes in a game or two each season, they’re the guys yelling, "Selling tickets?" as if they are desperate to get into the park for that night’s action. In fact, they are looking for people who might be stuck with a ticket or two, which the scalpers will gladly take off their hands for pennies on the dollar. They don’t want upper-bleacher tickets to the Toronto Blue Jays games, though; they want the mother lode: box seats, particularly for marquee match-ups.

What has always bothered me over the years is that these guys are doing business without any significant interference from Boston’s Finest, who are often hired by the team for detail work, sometimes undercover. According to the Herald, the Sox spent $50,000 on police details last season, culminating in a whopping 11 scalping arrests. In fact, all 11 cuffs were made in the same five-day weekend last August when the Yankees were in town for a crucial series.

Here’s my problem: first of all, $50,000 over the course of 81 home games comes out to about 600 bucks per game. One could debate whether that’s a significant amount to spend to get those shysters out of there. Second, what is the team getting for its $600? Deterrence? Maybe, but certainly not many of these schmoes are visiting the Big House, because I’m seeing the same guys selling tickets illegally game after game after game, without any fear of reprisal, much less incarceration. Many times I’ve even seen the hucksters chatting with the BPD detail officers supposedly there to shoo them away.

It’s a racket that seems to have no consequences, and this situation is directly responsible for the dearth of premium tickets available to you and me.

Once the phone lines for buying tickets opens, who has the time to keep re-dialing the Sox ticket office from nine to five each day? Not me, probably not you. Who has the time to wait all day in line at the park — over and over again — once the tickets go on sale to the general public? Die-hards, and those with nothing better to do — scalpers.

It’s a very profitable business, and reportedly illegal, but the team and the law-enforcement officials paid to crack down on the problem are doing next to nothing. Yes, for the most part it’s a victimless crime, and tax dollars might be better spent elsewhere nailing the city’s real bad guys. But when it comes right down to it, we probably don’t have many years left to see games at the 90-year-old ballpark, and everyone should have the access to do so. If the tickets are taken out of the scalpers’ hands, that means they’re available when you call or walk up to the ticket booth, and while you’ll still pay a lot, you won’t be putting money in the pockets of two-bit criminals.

In the meantime, I’ll be there for my 17th straight Opening Day next Monday, and for tips on how best to enjoy Friendly Fenway, check out the Phoenix’s Red Sox supplement in next week’s issue.

Sporting Eye runs Mondays and Fridays at BostonPhoenix.com. Christopher Young can be reached at cyoung[a]phx.com.