Around 3 million minutes have passed through the hourglass, known as “yesterday,” since I witnessed the Chicago Cubs hoisting the Commissioner’s Trophy, on a rainy, warm, November night, in Cleveland, OH.
I was standing in my living room, watching Rajai Davis’ 2-run homer, off Aroldis Chapman, hit the camera in the left-field concourse.
“Seriously?”
“OF COURSE, this makes sense.”
Silently, I stood there thinking these things, but the ONE thing that had saved me through many stressful moments, in my life kept me from losing it… The eternal optimism of being a Cubs fan from the day I was born (1979), no matter how bleak a situation is looking.
I wonder how “normal” teams’ fans react to losing a 4-run lead, in the 8th inning of game 7 of the World Series? I CAN guarantee you that online retailers missed out on a HUGE sale of new televisions on November 3rd because it DID happen to the Cubs.
We have been weathered the extremely heart-breaking. We do not necessarily come to expect the worst to happen (even though it IS in the back of our minds), but we are not shocked when it does.
SIDE-NOTE: There has been a lifetime of atrocities in MY almost 43 years on Earth. I will be deep-diving into those, in my head, while I write the rest of this article!
The rain came, after the bottom of the ninth.
“Makes sense,” I thought, “Why not give us a little more time to think about it… let it marinate.”
As we all know, 17 minutes of rain washed away 108 years of anguish. That night cemented the fact that I will die having known a world where the Chicago Cubs were the World Series Champions.
Before that night, I often wondered what it would be like, as a Cubs fan, after they FINALLY won it. Odd, right?
Would the Cubs winning the World Series turn me into a Yankees fan in royal blue pinstripes? Would a title make me demand one every year following, and then deem every season a failure if they did not come through?
The first 37 years of my life made me HOPE, a ring would not change me as a fan. I HOPED it would not change the organizational structure of the “Loveable Losers” who helped form me, as a person of eternal optimism.
Recently, I searched for the general prospects, for the Cubs’ season, by those in the know. “Rebuilding”; “developing”; “fringe”; “not their year” were many of the terms I found that correlated with the 2022 Chicago Cubs.
There it is… they have returned to their lane.
There will be additions made to the roster, maybe not what people hope, but enough of a splash to put the fans in the stands (Marcus Stroman). There will be prospects! “The next Anthony Rizzo” or “This guy has 2015 Jake Arrieta-type stuff!” Some might pan out, but they will get too expensive, and they will go. The Cubs will trade some prospects for a “help now” piece in a year they are in contention for the playoffs, and it will turn out like Todd Zeile or Steve Buechele.
While fans might change their ways of fandom, the organization has set back up in its pre-2016 existence.
There were changes. The biggest was with ticket prices, at Wrigley, going WAY UP. It is a financial burden to take my family of six to see a game at the Friendly Confines. There are ways to keep from depriving my boys of seeing the Cubs… we see them play on the road! I bought six tickets, for a road game, in June, for the price TWO tickets would cost at Wrigley… it is a no-brainer!
I have decided that it will be a “rite of passage,” for my boys. When they turn 16, I will take them on a father-son trip to Wrigleyville. It will not be the same as when I went as a kid. They won, so there are EVEN MORE organizational fingerprints surrounding Wrigley, but if they are on the corner of Clark and Addison, it will ALWAYS feel like a town, and not a sterile-feeling stadium surrounded by parking lots.
Other than that, it is mostly the same organizational “Loveable Losers” mentality that existed before they won it all in 2016.
FOR ME, it is the most comfortable way to live life. HOPE the Cubs win… worry about the weather when I go to a game. Enjoy the memories made when I take in a game, consider THOSE the big wins, in life. Teams lose, and teams win. I am not at a point in my life where I can let my enjoyment, solely, be determined by the result of a game.
NO, I am not saying I do not care if the Cubs “Fly the W,” or not… I WANT another World Series title; I could not call myself a fan if I said it was not important! I CAN tell you, if the Chicago Cubs do not win a World Series again, in my lifetime, I can say I am part of the population who can say I was alive when it happened. I am SO LUCKY to have that capability!
While I feel the Cubs have returned to their pre-2016 existence, I still hope for another title, but if it never happens, I can still say, “Today, I consider myself the luckiest…” No, wait, already taken.
How about, “Go Cubs Go!”
