This wasn’t originally going to be a Cubs post, even though I write from the heart of the mayhem.
But it’s all just too much, I couldn’t take it anymore.
It all started this morning about 5:45 with SportsCenter. Hoping to just hear the best from excited Cubs fans on this the first day of the playoffs, I was greeted with something awful. The anchor (who will remain anonymous) said to lead off the show:
“Winning the Series would be both good and bad in the eyes of Cubs’ fans. They would break the team’s curse but lose the title of ‘Lovable Losers.”
If there is a team out there (ANYWHERE) whose fans DON’T want them to win so they can keep the image of losers, please kill me now. Also, since when does said anchor speak for all of Cubdome?
And that got me thinking…
Lots of people (throw me in there) stereotype your everyday Cubs’ fan as either 1.) a sorority girl in her pink Soriano jersey or 2.) an East-Coast frat boy with Jimmy Clausen’s hair who bought all the “Welcome to the gun show” shirts from Urban Outfitters.
But, since I’ve moved to Chicago, I haven’t met a single fan that fits that description (except when I actually went to Wrigley for a game).
Most are loyal (to say the least) Cubby fans. They have one goal, to see their team win the World Series. Something, you may have heard, they haven’t done a very good job of lately.
And awhile later, while pondering these deep thoughts, I came across this (non)story in the New York Times.
Steve Bartman still isn’t talking to the media? OMG! Please write about it and include lots of questions with no answers and plenty of references to phones being hung up upon answer:
But does he still hold his old job and still live with his parents in this suburb northwest of Chicago, about 16 miles from Wrigley? ‘I know the answer to that question,’ Zillmer said.
Check
Another phone call, to a neighbor of Bartman’s parents, resulted in a phone receiver being quickly hung up . . . Two visits to the family home in a three-day period yielded no Bartman sightings and no answer to a knock on the door.
Double check.
They just won’t drop it.
So for God’s sake, Cubs, win the World Series. Win and away go the stereotypes of your fans and the stories about your ugly past which aren’t fun to read anymore. Away go taunts from your cross town “rivals” and their fans. Away goes everything…but your loyal fanbase.
The FynalCut 