October 22, 2015

"To top it off, in the seventh inning, a trumpeter stood on the sidewalk at Waveland and Sheffield and played 'Taps.'"

"Musical arrangements — as well as the body language of dejected fans — took queues from a scoreboard that went lopsided early and completed a four-game Mets sweep of the Cubs..."
Cubs fan Scott Jastram... got a tear in his eye when, as the game concluded, fans chanted: “Let’s go Cubbies!” “I’d say 70 percent of the fans stayed to the end,” said Jastram, 48, who attended the game with Tom Pirone, a pal from New York who supports the Mets.

“I just texted a buddy back in Queens: ‘Classiest fans I’ve ever been around,’ ” Pirone said after the game.

41 comments:

Scott said...

Of course Cubs fans are classy losers. They've had lots and lots of practice.

MadisonMan said...

I guess the Sun Times copy editors are too hung over to recognize the difference between cue and queue.

Tom B said...
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Tom B said...

I guess the Sun Times copy editors are too hung over to recognize the difference between cue and queue.

This is why I do not trust that the products of our news media present a view of the world that approaches anything like reality, no matter the topic. They can't even seem to use words correctly.

Cute story though, too bad about the Cubs.

Big Mike said...

So the scriptwriters for "Back to the Future" didn't quite get the Cubs' destiny right, did they?

traditionalguy said...

Thank God the NBA season is starting. Baseball is like watching paint dry.

David Begley said...

This Cubs team will make it to the World Series.

Static Ping said...

Big Mike: So the scriptwriters for "Back to the Future" didn't quite get the Cubs' destiny right, did they?

What did you expect when you make a time machine out of a DeLorean?

Curious George said...

"David Begley said...
This Cubs team will make it to the World Series."

Well, this is of course no longer possible. The next Cubs team may, or the one after that. They have a good nucleus, great farm system, brilliant executives, one of the best managers in baseball, and an owner with the cash to make it happen.

tim in vermont said...
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tim in vermont said...

I think the Red Sox and Cubs both suffered the "Curse of Fans Who are Blindly Loyal to an Iconic Ballpark"

campy said...

"This Cubs team will make it to the World Series."

Who will they root for?

Rusty said...

Campy wins.

Original Mike said...

So, Hell is still secure.

Birches said...

I thought for sure they'd pull out a win last night, because it was Back to the Future day. After the first inning, the team looked like they already lost. There was still plenty of time to mount a comeback, but I saw their body language and knew it wasn't going to happen. I guess I'm rooting for the Mets now.

ganderson said...

"Do they still play the blues in Chicago when baseball season comes around?
When the snow melts away do the Cubbies still play in their ivy-covered burial ground?
When I was a boy they were my pride and joy, but now they only bring fatigue
To the home of the brave, the land of the free, and the doormat of the National League."

Well they are not doormats anymore, but the rest holds. And, traditionalguy, as the great John Mariucci, of Eveleth,MN, who played for the Black Hawks in the 40s, when Americans were essentially blackballed from the NHL used to say " Watching basketball is like watching old men fish."

Kyzer SoSay said...

In sports, I tend to root for the underdogs.

I was a Mets fan when I grew up in NY, mainly because as bad as the Yankees were until they won the WS in 98(?), the Mets were almost always worse.

When I moved to Chicago, I decided to start rooting for the Cubs, because at that point the Sox had won a WS about 3 years prior, and the Cubs were still the Cubs.

Basically, this NLCS was a win-win from my perspective. Whoever won this round was going to have my full support for the Fall Classic, and it just happened that the Mets completely dominated the Cubs. So it goes.

Kyzer SoSay said...

Gah, I meant the '96 series, when the Yanks beat the Braves.

Rusty said...

In my best Nelson Muntz;

Ha, ha

mccullough said...

Mets pitching was excellent. Should be a fun World Series.

mezzrow said...

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops. - Bart Giamatti

Credit Al Yellen at BleedCubbieBlue for this.

Quaestor said...

Thank God the NBA season is starting. Baseball is like watching paint dry.

Baseball is a game for the cerebral cortex. Basketball, particularly the NBA variant, mostly lights up the amygdala.

tim in vermont said...

Baseball is best enjoyed in the summer on the radio in the garage, while repairing an old engine. Sometime around mid September it becomes good TV.

mccullough said...

Basketball is a great sport. The players are very athletic. But the strategy, compared to other team sports, is pretty basic, other than the Spurs. They are pretty sophisticated in their various approaches.

Humperdink said...

I quit watching the NBA when the players could could take one dribble from half-court, make a lay-up and not be called for travelling.

amielalune said...

Basketball is for people with short attention spans.

Wilbur said...

"People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring." Rogers Hornsby

Curious George said...

"Scott said...Of course Cubs fans are classy losers. They've had lots and lots of practice."

Cub fans are almost always Bear fans, Blackhawk fans, and Bulls fans. That's 12 championships in my "fan lifetime."

mccullough said...

It would be 13 championships if you were a Sox fan.

Ctmom4 said...

Who plays Taps in the seventh inning? It's not over till it's over.

Anonymous said...

One of my brothers lived in the yellow brick apartment building across the street from left field, before the roof had bleachers. I had the privilege of watching one game from the deck on the roof. What a great bunch of baseball nuts his neighbors were. That is one of my fondest memories. That brother died in 2009 at age 52.

the wolf said...

Egad, if I have to read one more story about how "classy" Cubs fans are, I'm gonna plotz.

Beldar said...

My Astros are tied, with the Brewers, for next-to-last among all MLB teams in total number of World Series appearances, in positions number 27 & 28 -- one appearance, no championships. Only the Nationals/Expos and the Mariners (no appearances) trail.

I think this was the Cubbies' eleventh appearance (with two championships). I do not defer to them as a long-frustrated fan. But I was certainly rooting for them against the Mets.

Wilbur said...



Blogger the wolf said...
Egad, if I have to read one more story about how "classy" Cubs fans are, I'm gonna plotz


As a 50 year Cub fan I ... agree.

It's a narrative, almost a stereotype. And like many of them, they contain a kernel of truth. But those, and the Billy Goat, Bartman-type crap, have gotten very tiresome.

CWJ said...

I'm just glad the ALCS is leaving Rogers Centre and coming back to a park where you play baseball rather than wait for a home run.

mccullough said...

Beldar,

The first World Series was in 1903 and the Cubs were already in existence. Until baseball expanded in the early 1960s, there were 8 AL teams and 8 NL teams, just as there were in 1903.

The Astros started in 1962. The Brewers, nee Seattle Pilots, started in 1969, as did the Washington Nationals, nee Montreal Expos.


Nothing is comparable to the Cubs. There are a handful of people left on the planet who were alive in 1908 when the Cubs last won the World Series.

Those other teams have had to compete against many more teams. It's 15 NL and 15 AL now.

Plus, unlike most teams, the Cubs, like the Yankees and Dodgers, have a lot of money to spend.

CWJ said...
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mccullough said...

1990 was 25 years ago. 1975 and 1976 were within 40 years.

The Cubs began in 1870 as the Chicago White Stockings, and went through a handful of name changes. Starting with the 1903 season, they have been the Chicago Cubs (the four seasons before that they were the Chicago Orphans, a much more appropriate name.

The Chucago White Sox started in 1901 and have always been the Chicago White Sox.

Wilbur said...

The Cubs are different now. It starts at the top.

The difference in the Cubs of today and their previous owners (primarily Phillip Wrigley, then The Tribune Company) is that at present the Cubs have high-quality ownership (the Ricketts family) who hire the best management people available, on and off the field. Ownership developed a long-term plan with them, and let them execute it.

Mr. Wrigley let the Cubs fall way behind the curve in failing to develop a minor league system until many years after most other teams. The Tribune ran the team with a corporate eye towards the bottom line, leading to decisions made with the short-term in mind.

mccullough said...

The Cubs will be different when they win a World Series, or at least get to one. A week ago, Cubs fans were bragging about how they were 7-0 against the Mets this season. Results are all that matter. The Ricketts have one winning season during their ownership. Cubs fans keep talking about the future because they are gullible.

Wilbur said...

mccullogh:


I agree that results are all that matter. I, as a knowledgeable and sabremetrically-inclined baseball fan, do indeed recognize the enormous difference in how the Cubs are being run now from in the past. If you can't see that, you are unreasonably biased or factually ignorant of the situation.

The Cubs future is bright, brighter than before my birth. It starts at the top, with the ownership, something true in all sports, and in all businesses. Positive future results are never guaranteed; too many factors are in play to assert that.

The Cubs are not a great team now; there are still roster problems to be addressed. Additionally, I expect a regression to the mean next season. One should expect a similar regression for the Mets next year.

Gullible? Maybe I am. We won't know for another 5 years.