World Series Ticket Demand Halts Rockies Computer [J. Mark English]

All those die hard Rockie fans going back to 1993 seem to be going nuts over their first World Series trip...

This is from Duncan Shaw of CBS News in Denver:

Colorado Rockies officials said Monday night their computer system for online-only World Series ticket sales was the target of an "external malicious attack," and that online ticket sales will resume at noon Tuesday.

Team spokesperson Jay Alves couldn't immediately provide details of the attack. He said nearly 18,000 tickets were available for each game in Denver -- Games 3, 4, and 5, if necessary -- on Saturday, Sunday and Monday....

....he company that handles online ticket sales for the Colorado Rockies told CBS4 News it isn't sure what caused its systems to crash on Monday morning.

"They are amazed and overwhelmed at what happened here this morning," said Colorado Rockies spokesman Jay Alves. He said Irvine, Calif.-based Paciolan's servers received 8.5 million visits in the first hour-and-a-half after the tickets for the World Series games at Coors Field went on sale at 10 a.m.

Spokesman Shaw Taylor said Paciolan is looking at the issues that led to the crash. He told CBS4 News one possible cause may have been a large-scale denial-of-service attack.

Paciolan is the official ticket vendor for Major League Baseball. It handles ticketing for more than 700 college and professional sports teams, as well as other live events. According to the company's Web site, it sold 25 percent of all live event tickets in the United States last year.