Free admission! (Photo by Brian Allen)

Despite their recent win, tickets to Washington Wizards game aren’t exactly in high demand—much less are they fetching premium prices. But one season-ticket holder has found a clever twist to his ticket-selling scheme: he won’t cut you a break on the price of the upper deck ticket, but he will offer you a full refund if the team loses.

Say you want to head to the Verizon Center next Tuesday to see the Wizards take on the star-studded Miami Heat. On his Craigslist ad—which has tickets for games running through the end of the season—Wizards fan Tim (he asked that we not use his last name) is offering up single tickets for $200. That’s certainly not cheap, especially considering how awful the home team is. But if the Wizards lose—and they should; the Heat are currently 10-3—you’ll get your money back in full.

“I am selling a lot of these games for less than what I paid anyway, so I might as well have a little fun with it,” explained Tim, who lives in Ellicott City and has been a season-ticket holder for a few years. “With the way the pricing structure is, I figure as long as the Wizards win one out of every four home games, I think I will break even.”

He knows that the marketplace is flush with tickets, but says that his offer—which pits a fan’s economic interest (free tickets!) against their devotion to the team (a winning season!)—is one that most buyers will be willing to gamble on. “Buyers are paying more for these tickets than they would through the secondary market (although almost all of them are still below face value), but they are getting the opportunity to get their money back if the Wizards do not win.”

All told, it seems to be working. “For a normal Craigslist post, I get about two or three responses, with this post, I have gotten over 100. I save all that info to include in future sales efforts for the Wizards games that I cannot go to.”

Tim isn’t completely missing out on the action, though—he’s got his own set of tickets.