World Series Dreams Voided
By HARRY HAIRSTON
Updated 12:00 PM EST, Wed, Jul 22, 2009
Brent Blanchard says he dropped more than $2,000 online with Ice Tix, a ticket broker, on four tickets to game five of the World Series.
Ice Tix say they originally purchased the tickets from Stub Hub.
Blanchard took his son and sold the other two tickets to his friend John Golden who waited decades for this moment with his own father.
"My father had gone to the final game in 1980 and I was too young then but we talked all our lives that when it happens again we are going to go together," Golden said.
Heavy rains forced play to stop until two days later. But the foursome says, instead of returning to a field of dreams, they walked into a foul situation.
"Me and my son got in with our two then the other two of my four tickets that I had they said they're void and they wouldn't let them through the turnstile," Blanchard said.
"We go to the turnstile and it's like National Lampoon -- sorry folks the parks closed -- but it's not funny it's heart breaking no, no, no there's some mistake some terrible mistake," Golden added.
Blanchard continued: "We were basically told that someone called our tickets in stolen and the Phillies voided our tickets and reissued our tickets."
But, John Weber, the Phillies V.P. of Tickets and Operations said Golden and his father still should have gotten in.
"We had mechanisms in place to help them on that evening if they didn't go to a window I don't have information on that," Weber said.
Golden says he did go to the ticket window. And, when he got there, not only was he shutout, but so were dozens of others with the same problem.
"There were people wailing and crying like their children had been kidnapped," said Golden.
"I just had a pit in my stomach like how could this happen the four of us went through this whole Phillies experience together and it was just ruined all of a sudden," Blanchard said.
The men say they're angry the Phillies won't identify the season ticket holder who canceled their tickets. So, they took out an ad in the inquirer hoping others shutout that night will contact them.
"We figure if the Phillies don't listen to just one group of two or three people maybe they'll listen to a group of 50 or 100 people,” said Blanchard
"Once we get all of the information that we have we'll try to help them out best we can," Weber explained.
The Phillies did offer the men two tickets to a regular season game next season, but both Blanchard and Golden already feel like they missed out on a lifetime experience.
The team also said they plan to meet with Blanchard soon to discuss the issue.
First Published: Dec 16, 2008 7:07 PM EST
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