Game 2 of the Crosstown Classic had much more drama than the first game on Wednesday – especially for Cubs fans. First, Carlos Zambrano was back pitching after his May 27th meltdown versus the Pittsburgh Pirates. Second, with the Cubs trailing 5-1 heading into the bottom of the 8th all signs pointed to a two-game sweep for the White Sox.

However, the Cubs rallied against Scott Linebrink and scored 4 runs in the 8th inning after Derrek Lee hit a three-run home run and Geovany Soto followed that with a solo shot of this own. That enabled to Cubs to tie the game at 5 apiece and allowed Alfonso Soriano to single in the winning run in the bottom of the 9th inning.

Obtaining Tickets
Before the game I had planned to buy a $15 standing room only ticket from the Cubs box office. However, when I got to the box office, the man in the window said that they could not get rid of their tickets and standing room was not available (the Cubs only sell SRO tickets once all of the seats are sold). The cheapest seat at the window was a $25 upper deck outfield.

I figured I could beat that price and started walking towards Wrigley Field’s main entrance on the corner of Clark St. and Addison St. I could not find a ticket for $10, but that’s when a teenager with an extra single offered his ticket for $20. I looked at the ticket and it was $85 face value. I accepted his price and was sitting behind home plate in aisle 124.

For the first few months of the season, the Crosstown Classic was selling for above to two times face value through StubHub. However, even though this is a Crosstown Classic game, it was played on a weekday afternoon, meaning the secondary ticket market prices bottom out towards game day. This is similar to the demand for tickets for weekday afternoon MLB playoff games. Most fans believe they will be able to make money on MLB playoff tickets. However, once the game time is set as a weekday afternoon game, you can generally buy playoff tickets for about 50% of face value. There was no difference with yesterday’s game.