Cubbies Post an L (Sorry, not sorry)

My fear for October has been that we’d end up with a World Series between the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs. This was a remote fear: I really don’t see the Red Sox, despite having had a stellar year, making it to the World Series. And in the wee small hours of the morning on Wednesday, the Cubbies lost a 13 inning Wild Card heartbreaker. One and done.

So Cubs vs. Red Sox is no longer my fear. And given how many fears I’ve got ratcheting around my brain these days, I’m happy to jettison this one.

Why, you may be asking, was the Red Sox-Cubs series such a fear factor for me? After all, wasn’t this the potential series that the media powers that be most wanted to see play out? (That or Los Angeles, nee Brooklyn, Dodgers vs. New York Yankees.)

Red Sox vs. Cubs. What’s not to like? Two teams from the pre-expansion 8-team leagues, from the way-back days when the professional baseball world ended in St. Louis, and teams schlepped from one city to the next in sleeper cars on trains. Both play in quaint old-time ball parks. (I believe they’re the only teams still playing in parks that are 100+ years old.) Lovable, cursed losers who struggled so long and hard to finally win the big one for their fans – the Red Sox having broken their 86 year old curse in 2004 (and going on to win the World Series again in 2007 and 2013), and the Cubs taking home the trophy in 2016. Their first such win – astoundingly – since 1908.

Oh, this matchup would have been even better in 2003, when neither team had won a modern era Series. In 2003, it almost happened. Then the Red Sox lost the AL championship to the Evil Empire that was the New York Yankees. Local journalist Marty Nolan summed that one up perfectly:

The Red Sox killed my father and now they’re coming for me.

For a month or so after the debacle, I had that sign up on my office door.

But things went even worse for the Cubs. A few outs away from a win that would send them to the World Series for the first time since 1945, a hapless fan reached in and interfered with a play. In the aftermath, the Cubs blew a lead, lost the next game and that was that.

Anyway, ain’t gonna happen this year.

Bless you, oh baseball gods

But back to why I was dreading this.

I just didn’t want to put up with:

All that swooning about the ballparks: I love Fenway Park. Yes, the seats were built for a world in which the average man was 5’8”. That’s just a bit over my height, so I’m okay. But there’s always a 6’2” man-spreader in the seat next to me. Still, I love Fenway – and believe there are two near-perfect urban experiences, one of which being able to walk to a baseball game. (The other is skating/watching skating in an outdoor rink.) You can also walk to a game at Wrigley, which is plunked down in a residential neighborhood. Both Wrigley and Fenway are excellent baseball venues. Complete sweethearts. Still, I didn’t want to hear game announcers go on and on about the history and quirks of Fenway and Wrigley. Not to mention the fan-base similarities. (Forget what you’ve heard about Midwest Nice. Doesn’t apply to Chicago. Their fans are like ours. We’re Massholes. Cubs fans are the Illinois equivalent. Other than my Cubbie fan relatives. Most of them, anyway.) We have been spared! Thank you baseball gods!

Rehashing the long painful path to those recent World Series for each of these teams. Frankly, much of my baseball watching life (which began when I was 2 years old) was spent watching crappy teams (the early years), followed by years spent watching the Sox do a once-a-decade seventh game loss in the World Series (so near and yet so far in 1967, 1975, 1986). And then there were the almost-glory years when the Red Sox were one big tease. Almost but not quite. Here and no further. And then, miraculously, 2004. Anyway, I don’t have to hear it rehashed. It’s my lived history. And I suspect that a lot of Cubs fans feel the same way. Basta! But we have been spared! Thank you baseball gods!

Endless nattering about Theo Epstein. Theo is the Cubs’ General Manager, and it was on his watch that the Cubs won their World Series in 2016. The same Theo Epstein – lifelong Red Sox fan who grew up within walking distance of Fenway Park – who was the Red Sox GM when they won their World Series in 2004. And who temporarily quit the GM job on Halloween of 2005, infamously exiting Fenway Park wearing a gorilla costume. Nope. Don’t want to hear about Theo Epstein’s torn/untorn loyalties. Didn’t want to hear about the gorilla costume. We have been spared! Thank you baseball gods! 

The potential that Jon Lester would smoke the Red Sox in a game or two. Jon Lester wasn’t around for the 2004 Series. He was just a kid of 20. But he was instrumental, an ace on those 2007 and 2013 World Series winning Red Sox team. And then he moved out to Chicago to be with Theo and was instrumental, an ace on the Cubs 2016 World Series winner. Did I want Jon Lester to smoke the Red Sox in the World Series? NFW. We have been spared! Thank you baseball gods! 

As one of those baptized-a-Catholic-but-born-a-Red-Sox-fan, of course, I want the Red Sox to go to the World Series. And I want them to win. It’s fun in town when the Red Sox are in it. And now that the Red Sox reversed the curse and then some, I no longer fret the games. If they win, great. If they don’t, so be it.

As long as it’s not the Yankees. If it can’t be the Red Sox, I would be a Go, Cubbies kind of fan if they made it that far. I am, after all, half Chicago (my mother’s side). But since they’re out, if the Red Sox aren’t going to make it, I’m rooting for the Cleveland Indians.

Meanwhile, I’m just pleased we won’t have to put up with Chicago Cubs vs. Boston Red Sox. I so did not want to play that ball.