Wrigley Field has played host to a wide variety of events during its 109 years of existence. From Cubs games to Jimmy Buffet concerts to Ferris Bueller's day off. But one thing that has never happened inside of baseball's Friendly Confines?
England's oldest pastime.
"So, I have it on good authority that there's never been a cricket match at Wrigley Field," British musician Felix White said during a recent visit to Chicago's hallowed grounds.
White spent a few days on the North Side earlier this season during a Cardinals-Cubs series -- ahead of the games between the two rivals in London this weekend. The BBC sports presenter, who will be part of the London Series broadcast team, wanted to learn about what makes baseball so special in America, why the Cubs have such a storied history and how deep the rivalry between the two NL Central foes really goes.
He pulled up a barstool at Murphy's Bleachers, he stepped into the booth with Boog Sciambi, he spoke with Harry Cara -- um -- Ryan Dempster and he ran his fingers through the famous ivy along the outfield walls. You can see his entire visit in the main clip above.
One of the highlights of the trip was when he took Cubs players Patrick Wisdom and Hayden Wesneski out for a quick cricket lesson in the outfield. The two seemed to figure out the sport quickly -- even after Wisdom jokingly called the cricket ball a pool ball. The third baseman, who was on a tear at the time, struck the ball as well as he did from home plate during an MLB game.
But perhaps the best moment was at the very end of the clip, when White is filmed sitting in the bleachers during a game. He seems to grasp what the ballpark and the sport of baseball mean to so many people in the U.S. -- almost sounding like a poet, or I guess the lyricist that he is.
"There's a genuine endless beauty to baseball," he says. "From an English perspective, when you come here, the kind of fantasy of it is that you feel like you're inside a film or a dream. But the earthier side of it is that it's actually real and there are people's stories everywhere here."