Three hours before the U.S. played Paraguay in the World Cup in June, Ricky Zaragoza was standing outside SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif., with his father and no tickets. He had waited for this day since March 2025, when he paid $2,162.90 for a pair of seats as a birthday gift for his dad. Four days earlier, Zaragoza had called online ticketing platform StubHub to say his tickets still weren’t in the FIFA app. The company promised replacements by noon the next day. An anxious Zaragoza spoke with StubHub at least 10 times in calls that spanned nearly three hours…

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