The
Chicago Cubs are an American
professional
baseball team based in Chicago
, Illinois
.
They are members of the
Central
Division of
Major League
Baseball's
National League. They
are one of two Major League clubs based in Chicago (the other being
the
Chicago White Sox), the Cubs
are also one of the two remaining charter members of the National
League (the other being the
Atlanta
Braves). The franchise has not won a championship in 101 years,
which is longer than that of any other
major
North American professional sports team.
The Cubs
are often referred as "The North Siders" because
Wrigley
Field
, where they have played their home games since
1916, is located in Chicago's north side Lakeview
community. They are also often called
"The Boys in
Blue" noting the team's primary uniform color, (which
itself is often referred to as "Cubbie Blue") or simply as
"The Cubbies."
Chicago's manager is
Lou Piniella, and
their
general manager is
Jim Hendry. The Cubs have rivalries with the
St. Louis Cardinals,
the
Milwaukee Brewers,
and the cross-town
Chicago White Sox.
The Cubs are currently owned by a family trust of
TD Ameritrade founder
Joe Ricketts, with his son
Tom Ricketts operating the team on a
daily basis. The Ricketts family purchased the team from the
Tribune Company in 2009, with the
sale closing shortly after the end of the regular season.
Early franchise history
1870-1875: Chicago White Stockings
The success and fame of the
Cincinnati Red Stockings (c. 1869),
baseball's first openly all-
professional
team, led to a minor explosion of other openly professional teams,
each with the singular goal of defeating the Red Stockings. On
April 29, 1870, the
Chicago Base Ball Club played
their first game, an exhibition, against the St. Louis Unions,
defeating them 47-1. The White Stockings, who played home games on
Chicago's west side at the
Union Base-Ball Grounds,
joined the nation's principal amateur league
National Association
of Base Ball Players, when the league began to allow
professional teams. The
NABBP was previously
dominated by the
Brooklyn
Atlantics, who had won three straight titles and were the
sport's first "dynasty", but Chicago won the N.A. championship in
the league's final year of operation.
The now all professional
Chicago White Stockings,
financed by businessman
William
Hulbert, became a charter member of the
National
Association of Professional Base Ball Players, the
nation's first all professional league, in 1871. The White
Stockings were close contenders all season, despite the fact that
the
Great Chicago Fire had
destroyed the team's home field and most of their equipment. The
White Stockings finished the season in second place, but ultimately
were forced to drop out of the league during the city's recovery
period, finally returning to National Association play in 1874.
Over the next couple seasons, The
Boston Red Stockings dominated the
league and hoarded many of the game's best players, even those who
were under contract with other teams. After
Davy Force signed with Chicago, and then breached
his contract to play in Boston, Hulbert became discouraged by the
"contract jumping" as well as the overall disorganization
of the N.A., and thus spearheaded the movement to form a stronger
organization. The end result of his efforts was the formation of a
much more "ethical" league, which became known as the
National Base Ball
League, and thus the
Chicago National League
Ball Club was born.
1876–1902: A National League Dynasty

The 1876 White Stockings won the
N.L.
, retaining his position as Chicago's club president, signed
multiple star players, such as pitcher
Albert Spalding, and infielders
Ross Barnes,
Deacon
White and
Adrian Anson to join the
team prior to the N.L.'s inaugural season of
1876.
The Chicago franchise, playing its home games
at West Side
Grounds
, quickly established themselves as one of
the new league's top teams. Spalding won 47 games and Barnes
led the league in hitting at .429 as Chicago won the first ever
National League
pennant, which at
the time was the game's top prize.
After back to back pennants in 1880 and '81, Hulbert died, and Al
Spalding, who had retired to start
Spalding sporting goods, assumed
ownership of the club. The White Stockings, with Anson acting as
player/manager, captured their third consecutive pennant in 1882,
and "Cap" Anson established himself as the game's first true
superstar. In 1885 and '86, after winning N.L. pennants, The White
Stockings met the short-lived
American
Association champion in that era's version of a World
Series. Both seasons resulted in matchups with the
St. Louis Brown Stockings, with the
clubs tying in '85 and with St. Louis winning in '86. This was the
genesis of what would eventually become one of the greatest
rivalries in
sports. In all, the Anson-led Chicago Base Ball Club won six
National League pennants between 1876 and 1886. As a result,
Chicago's club nickname transitioned, and by
1890 they had become known as the
Chicago Colts, or sometimes "Anson's Colts,"
referring to Cap's influence within the club. Anson was the first
player in history to collect 3,000 hits, and when he left the team
in 1898, the loss of his leadership resulted in the team becoming
known as the
Chicago Orphans (or Remnants) and a
few forgettable seasons. After the
1900 season, the
American Base-Ball League
formed as a rival professional league, and incidentally the club's
old White Stockings nickname would be adopted by a new American
League neighbor to the south.
1902–1920: A Cub dynasty

The 1906 Cubs won a record 116 of 154
games.
They then won back to back World Series titles in
1907-08
In 1902, Spalding, who by this time had revamped the roster to
boast what would soon be one of the best teams of the early
century, sold the club to
Jim Hart, and the
franchise ultimately became known as the
Chicago
Cubs. During this period, which has become known as
baseball's
dead-ball era, three Cub
infielders;
Joe
Tinker,
Johnny Evers, and
Frank Chance were made famous as a double-play
combination by
Franklin P.
Adams' poem
Baseball's Sad Lexicon. The poem
first appeared in the July 18, 1910 edition of the
New York Evening Mail.
Mordecai "Three-Finger" Brown,
Jack Taylor,
Ed Reulbach,
Jack Pfiester and
Orval Overall were several key pitchers for
the Cubs during this time period. With Chance acting as
player-manager from 1903 to 1912 the Cubs won four pennants and two
World Series titles over a five-year span. Although they fell to
the White Sox in the
1906 World
Series, The Cubs recorded a record 116 victories and the
best winning
percentage (.763) of the modern era. With mostly the same
roster, Chicago won back to back World Series championships in
1907 and
1908. Their appearance in 3 consecutive
World Series made the Cubs the first Major League Club to play 3
times in the Fall Classic. Likewise, their back-to-back World
Series victories in 1907 and 1908 made them the first modern club
to win 2 World Series.

1913 Cubs
The next season, veteran catcher
Johnny
Kling left the team to become a professional
pocket billiards player. Some historians
think Kling's absence was significant enough to prevent the Cubs
from also winning a third straight title in 1909, as they finished
6 games out of first place. When Kling returned the next year, the
Cubs won the
pennant again, but
lost to the Philadelphia Athletics in the
1910 World Series.
In
1914, advertising executive
Albert Lasker obtained a large block of shares
and before the 1916 season had assumed majority ownership of the
franchise. Lasker quickly acquired the services of astute baseball
man
William Veeck, Sr. to run his
new team, and brought in a wealthy partner,
Charles Weeghman. Weeghman was the
proprietor of a popular chain of lunch counters who had previously
owned the
Chicago Whales of the
short-lived
Federal League.
As
principal owners, the pair moved the club from the West Side
Grounds to the much newer Weeghman Park
, which had been constructed for the Whales two
years earlier. The club responded by winning a pennant in
the war-shortened season of 1918, where they played a part in
another team's curse. The
Boston Red
Sox defeated
Grover
Cleveland Alexander's Cubs four games to two in the
1918 World Series. Afterward, Boston sold
its star pitcher,
Babe Ruth, to the
New York Yankees, starting a tale
of futility which would last 86 years, known as
Curse of the Bambino.
The Wrigley years (1921–1981)
Double-Bills take over

Cub logo in the '20s & '30s
During what is often called baseball's
"golden age," one of Cubs's
minority owners,
William Wrigley
Jr., who also happened to be the owner of
Wrigley Company, a Chicago-based maker of
chewing gum, would begin to increase his share of ownership. In
1921 Wrigley bought Weeghman's shares and in 1925 had acquired most
of Lakser's shares as well. The home park name was changed to its
current name, Wrigley Field, during this time. Additionally, the
area around the ballpark came to be known as "Wrigleyville." With
his vast monetary resources and Veeck's front-office savvy, the
"double-Bills" soon had the Cubs back in business in the National
League, building a team that would put numerous future Hall of
Famers in Cub uniforms. Some of the most notable of these players
were
Hack Wilson,
Gabby Hartnett, and
Rogers Hornsby. Chicago remained strong
contenders for the next decade.
1929–1938: Every Three Years
During the end of the first decade of the double-Bills' guidance,
the Cubs won the NL pennant in 1929 and then achieved the unusual
feat of winning a pennant every three years, following up the 1929
flag with league titles in 1932, 1935, and 1938. Unfortunately,
their success did not extend to the
Fall Classic, as they fell to
their
AL rivals each time. The
'32 series against the
Yankees featured Babe Ruth's
"
called shot" at Wrigley
Field. There were some historic moments for the Cubs as well; they
claimed the '35 pennant in thrilling fashion, winning a record 21
games in a row in September. The
'38 club saw
Dizzy Dean lead the team's pitching staff and
provided a historic moment when they won a crucial late-season game
at Wrigley Field over the
Pittsburgh Pirates with a
walk-off home run by Gabby
Hartnett, which became known in baseball
lore
as "
The Homer in the
Gloamin'". By 1939, the "double-Bills" (Wrigley and Veeck) had
both died, and the front office, now under
P.K. Wrigley, found
itself unable to rekindle the kind of success that P.K.'s father
had created, and so the team slipped into a few years of
mediocrity.
1945: The Curse
The Cubs enjoyed one more pennant at the close of
World War II, finishing 98–56.
Due to the wartime travel restrictions, the first three games
of the 1945 World Series were
played in Detroit
, where the Cubs won two games, including a
one-hitter by Claude Passeau, and the
final four were played at Wrigley. In Game 4 of the Series,
the
Curse of the Billy Goat
was allegedly laid upon the Cubs when P.K. Wrigley ejected
Billy Sianis, who had come to Game 4 with two
box seat tickets, one for him and one for his goat. They paraded
around for a few innings, but Wrigley demanded the goat leave the
park due to its unpleasant odor. Upon his ejection, Mr. Sianis
uttered,
"The Cubs, they ain't gonna win no more." The
Cubs lost Game 4, lost the Series, and have not been back since. It
has also been said by many that Sianis put a "curse" on the Cubs,
apparently preventing the team from playing in the World Series.
After losing the 1945 World Series, the Cubs finished with winning
seasons the next two years, but those teams did not enter
post-season play.
In the following two decades after Sianis' ill will, the Cubs
played mostly forgettable baseball, finishing among the worst teams
in the National League on an almost annual basis. Longtime
infielder/manager
Phil Cavarretta,
who had been a key player during the '45 season, was fired during
spring training in 1954 after admitting the team was unlikely to
finish above fifth place. Although shortstop
Ernie Banks would become one of the star players
in the league during the next decade, finding help for him proved a
difficult task, as quality players such as
Hank Sauer were few and far between. This,
combined with poor ownership decisions (such as the
College of Coaches), hampered on-field
performance.
1969: The fall of '69
The late-1960s brought hope of a renaissance, with third baseman
Ron Santo, pitcher
Ferguson Jenkins, and outfielder
Billy Williams joining
Banks. After losing a dismal 103 games in 1966, the Cubs brought
home consecutive winning records in
'67 and
'68, marking the first
time a Cub team had accomplished that feat in over two
decades.
In
1969 the Cubs,
managed by
Leo Durocher, built a
substantial lead in the newly created
National League Eastern Division by
mid-August.
Ken Holtzman pitched a
no-hitter on August 19, and the division lead grew to 8½ games over
the St. Louis Cardinals and by 9½ games over the
New York Mets. Ultimately,
however, the Cubs wilted under pressure. Although they had their
best season in decades at 92–70, they lost key games against the
Mets and finished the season a disappointing eight games out of
first place while the Mets exploded past them by winning
thirty-nine of their last fifty games.
Many superstitious
fans attribute this collapse to an incident at Shea Stadium
when a fan released a black cat onto the field,
further cursing the club, although the "Amazin' Mets"
ended the season at a torrid pace, finishing with a remarkable 100
wins.
1977–1979: The June Swoon
Following the '69 season, the club posted winning records for the
next few seasons, but no playoff action. After the core players of
those teams started to move on, the 70's got worse for the team,
and they became known as
"The Loveable Losers." In
1977, the team
found some life, but ultimately experienced one of its
biggest collapses. The Cubs hit a high-water mark on
June 28 at 47–22, boasting an 8 1/2 game NL East lead, as they were
led by
Bobby Murcer (27 Hr/89 RBI), and
Rick Reuschel (20–10). However, the
Philadelphia
Phillies cut the lead to two by the All-star break, as the Cubs
sat 19 games over .500, but they swooned late in the season, going
20–40 after July 31. The Northsiders finished in 4th place at
81–81, while Philadelphia surged, finishing with 103 wins.
Ironically, the following two seasons also saw the Cubs get off to
a fast start, as the team rallied to over 10 games above .500 well
into both seasons, only to again wear down and play poorly later
on, and ultimately settling back to mediocrity. This trait became
known as the "
June Swoon." Again, the Northsiders'
unusually high number of day games is often pointed to as one
reason for the team's inconsistent late season play.
1981–2009: The Tribune Era
1984: Heartbreak
After over a dozen more subpar seasons, GM
Dallas Green made a midseason deal to acquire
ace pitcher
Rick Sutcliffe from
Cleveland, who joined
Scott
Sanderson,
Dennis Eckersley,
Ron Cey and NL MVP
Ryne Sandberg on a squad that ultimately
tallied an NL-best 96 victories, winning the NL East. In the
NLCS,
skipper
Jim Frey's Cubs won the first two
games at Wrigley Field against the
San Diego Padres. The Cubs
needed to win only one game of the next three in San Diego to make
it back to the World Series. After being beaten in Game 3, the Cubs
lost Game 4 when dependable closer
Lee Smith allowed a game-winning home
run to
Steve Garvey in the bottom of
the ninth inning. In Game 5 the Cubs took a 3–0 lead to the 6th
inning, and a 3–2 lead into the seventh with Sutcliffe (who won the
Cy Young Award that year) still on
the mound. Then,
Leon Durham watched a
routine grounder go through his legs. This critical error helped
the Padres win the game and keep Chicago out of the
1984 World Series.
The following season hopes were high after the signing of
Dennis Eckersley. The club started out
well, going 35–19 through mid-June, but injuries to the pitching
staff and a 13 game losing streak pushed the Cubs out of
contention.
1989: NL East champions
In 1989, the first full season with night baseball at Wrigley
Field,
Don Zimmer's Cubs were led by a
core group of veterans in
Ryne
Sandberg,
Rick Sutcliffe and
Andre Dawson, who were boosted by a
crop of youngsters such as
Mark Grace,
Shawon Dunston,
Greg Maddux, Rookie of the Year
Jerome Walton, and Rookie of the Year
Runner-Up Dwight Smith. The Cubs won the NL East once again that
season winning 93 games. This time the Northsiders met the
San Francisco Giants in the
NLCS. After
splitting the first two games at home, the Cubs headed to the Bay
Area, where despite holding a lead at some point in each of the
next three games, bullpen meltdowns and managerial blunders
ultimately led to three straight losses. The Giants lost to
"
The Bash Brothers" and the
Oakland A's in the famous
"
Earthquake
Series."
1998: Wild card race & home run chase
The
'98 season
would begin on a somber note with the death of broadcaster
Harry Caray, and after the retirement of
Sandberg and the trading of Dunston, the Cubs needed to look
elsewhere for help, signing
Henry
Rodriguez to bat cleanup and provide protection for
Sammy Sosa in the lineup.
Mark Grace turned in one of his best seasons. The
club got a Rookie of the Year effort from pitcher
Kerry Wood, which included a one-hit, 20
strikeout performance versus the
Houston Astros.
"H-Rod"
paid immediate dividends by slugging 31 round-trippers, and Sosa
earned the N.L.'s MVP award with a 66 home run season. The club won
a down-to-the-wire
Wild Card
chase with the San Francisco Giants, culminating with the Cubs
beating the
Giants
in a one game playoff at Wrigley in which
Gary Gaetti hit the game winning homer and
propelled the Cubs into the postseason once again, with a 90–73
tally. Unfortunately, the
bats went cold in October, as manager
Jim Riggleman's club batted .183 and scored
only four runs en route to being swept by
Atlanta. On a positive note, the
home
run chase between Sosa,
Mark
McGwire and
Ken Griffey, Jr.
generated a great deal of media coverage, and helped to bring in a
new crop of fans as well as bringing back some fans who had been
disillusioned by the
1994 strike. The Cubs
retained many players who experienced career years in '98, and
after a fast start in 1999, they collapsed again (starting with
being swept at the hands of the cross-town
White Sox in mid-June) and
finished in the bottom of the division for the next two
seasons.
2001: Playoff push
Despite losing fan favorite Grace to free agency, and the lack of
production from newcomer
Todd Hundley,
skipper
Don Baylor's Cubs put together
good season in 2001. The
season started with Mack
Newton being brought in to preach "positive thinking." One of the
biggest stories of the season transpired as the club made a
midseason deal for
Fred McGriff, which
was drawn out for nearly a month as McGriff debated waiving his
no-trade clause, as the Northsiders
led the wild card race by 2.5 games in early September. That run
died when
Preston Wilson hit a three
run walk off homer off of closer
Tom "Flash"
Gordon, which halted the team's momentum. The team was unable
to make another serious charge, and finished at 88–74, only five
games behind both
Houston
and
St. Louis, who
tied for first. Sosa had perhaps his finest season and
Jon Lieber led the staff with a 20 win
season.
2003: 5 more outs
The Cubs had high expectations in 2002, but the squad played
poorly, and the club responded by hiring
Dusty Baker and by making some major moves in
'03. Most notably, they traded with the
Pittsburgh Pirates for
Kenny Lofton and
Aramis Ramirez (with the latter finally
filling a gaping hole at third base), and rode dominant pitching as
the Northsiders led the division down the stretch. Chicago halted
St. Louis' run by taking 4 of 5 games from the Redbirds in early
September and ultimately won their first division title in 14
years. In what was a dramatic five game series, their
NLDS victory over the
Atlanta Braves was the
franchise's first postseason series win since they won the World
Series in 1908. After dropping an extra-inning affair in Game 1,
the Northsiders rallied and took a 3 games to 1 lead over the Wild
Card
Florida Marlins in
the
NLCS.
Florida shut the Cubs out in Game 5, but young pitcher
Mark Prior led the Cubs in Game 6 as they took a
3–0 lead into the 8th inning and it was at this point when a
now-infamous incident took place. Several spectators attempted to
catch a foul ball off the bat of
Luis Castillo. One of the fans,
Steve Bartman, touched the
ball once it crossed into the stands, disrupting a potential catch
for the second out by
Moisés Alou.
Alou claimed he could have caught the ball and reacted angrily
toward the stands. Alou at one point recanted, saying he would not
have been able to catch the ball, but later said this was just an
attempt to make Bartman feel better believing the whole incident
should be forgotten. Interference was not called on the play, as
the ball was ruled to be on the spectator side of the wall. Neither
Alou nor Bartman were able to make the catch. Castillo was
eventually walked by Prior. Two batters later, and to the horror of
the packed stadium, Cubs shortstop
Alex
Gonzalez misplayed a potential inning ending double play,
loading the bases and leading to eight Florida runs and a Marlin
victory. Despite sending
Kerry Wood to
the mound and holding a lead twice, the Cubs ultimately dropped
Game 7, and failed to reach the
World
Series.
2004-2005
In
2004, despite
the return of
Greg Maddux and a
midseason deal for
Nomar
Garciaparra, misfortune struck the Cubs again. They led the
Wild Card by 1.5 games over
San Francisco and
Houston on September 25, and both
of those teams lost that day, giving the Northsiders a chance at
increasing the lead to a commanding 2.5 games with only eight games
remaining in the season, but reliever
LaTroy Hawkins blew a save to the
Mets, and the Cubs lost the game
in extra innings, a defeat that seemingly deflated the team, as
they proceeded to drop 6 of their last 8 games as the Astros won
the Wild Card. Despite the fact that the Cubs had won 89 games,
this fallout was decidedly unlovable, as the Cubs traded superstar
Sammy Sosa after he had left the season's
final game early and then lied about it publicly. Already a
controversial figure in the clubhouse after his
corked-bat incident, Sammy
alienated much of his fan base, the few teammates still on good
terms with him, and possibly tarnished his place in Cubs' lore for
years to come. The disappointing season also saw fans start to
become frustrated with the constant injuries to ace pitchers Mark
Prior and Kerry Wood. Additionally, the '04 season led to the
departure of popular commentator
Steve Stone, who had become
increasingly critical of management during broadcasts and was
verbally attacked by reliever
Kent
Mercker. Things were no better in
2005, despite a career
year from
Derrek Lee and the emergence of
closer
Ryan Dempster. The club
struggled and suffered more key injuries, only managing to win 79
games after being picked by many to be a serious contender for the
N.L. pennant.
2007-2008: Back to Back

Alfonso Soriano signed with the club
in 2007
After finishing last in the N.L. Central with 66 wins in 2006, the
Northsiders re-tooled and went from "worst to first" in 2007. In
the offseason they inked
Alfonso
Soriano to the richest contract in Cubs history, and replaced
unpopular skipper
Dusty Baker with fiery
veteran manager
Lou Piniella. After a
rough start, which included a brawl between
Michael Barrett and
Carlos Zambrano, the Cubs
overcame the
Milwaukee
Brewers, who had led the division for most of the season, with
winning streaks in June and July, coupled with a pair of dramatic,
late-inning wins against the
Reds, and ultimately clinched
the NL Central with a record of 85–77. They met
Arizona in the
NLDS, but controversy
followed as Piniella, in a move that has since come under scrutiny,
pulled Carlos Zambrano after the sixth inning of a pitchers duel
with
D-Backs ace Brandon Webb, to
"....save Zambrano for (a potential) Game 4." The Cubs, however,
were unable to come through, losing the first game and eventually
stranding over 30 baserunners in a 3-game Arizona sweep.
The Cubs successfully defended their National League Central title
in
2008, going to
the postseason in consecutive years for the first time since
1906–08. The offseason was dominated by three months of
unsuccessful trade talks with the
Orioles involving 2B
Brian Roberts, as well as the signing of
Chunichi Dragons star
Kosuke Fukudome. The team recorded their
10,000th win in April, while establishing an early division lead.
Reed Johnson and
Jim Edmonds were added early on and
Rich Harden was acquired from the
Oakland Athletics in early July. The Cubs
headed into the All-Star break with the N.L.'s best record, and
tied the league record with eight representatives to the
All-Star game,
including catcher
Geovany Soto, who was
named
Rookie of the
Year."The Boys in Blue" took control of the division by
sweeping a four game series in Milwaukee.
On September 14, in a
game moved to Miller Park
due to Hurricane Ike,
Zambrano pitched a no-hitter against the Astros, and six days later the
team clinched by beating St. Louis at Wrigley. The club
ended the season with a 98-64 record and met
Los Angeles in the
NLDS. The heavily
favored Cubs took an early lead in Game 1, but
James Loney's grand slam off
Ryan Dempster changed the series' momentum.
Chicago committed numerous critical errors and were outscored 20–6
in a Dodger sweep, which provided yet another sudden and stunning
ending to what had once been looked at as a season of
destiny.
2009-Present: Tom Ricketts takes over
2009: A step back and a look forward
Apparently handcuffed by Tribune's bankruptcy and the sale of the
club to the Ricketts' family, the Cubs' quest for a NL Central
3-peat started with notice that there would be less invested into
contracts than in previous years. Once again, however, trade
speculation dominated the headlines at the winter meetings, this
time surrounding Padres' ace
Jake Peavy,
which, much like the Brian Roberts talks a year earlier, resulted
in nothing. Piniella blamed the '08 post season failure on the lack
of left handed hitters, and a bevy of high caliber outfielders fit
the bill. Ultimately, the club settled on inking oft-troubled
switch hitter
Milton
Bradley over
Adam Dunn,
Raúl Ibáñez, and
Bobby Abreu. The bench and bullpen were also
overhauled in a bevy of money saving moves, and fan favorites Kerry
Wood and Mark DeRosa both left for the
Cleveland Indians.
Kevin Gregg was acquired from the Marlins to
replace Wood, and
Aaron Miles was signed
to replace DeRosa.
Led by the strong play of
Derrek Lee,
Ted Lilly and rookie pitcher
Randy Wells, the club started well, but fell on
hard times as injuries took their toll. Nearly every key player
suffered injury and the Northsiders struggled into the All Star
break with a disappointing .500 record.
Carlos Mármol eventually replaced Gregg
as closer and the team stayed in the race, but they were distracted
by Bradley, whose poor hitting and even poorer attitude became a
major issue as the season progressed. Bradley complained about
being heckled, booed and "hated" by bleacher fans and expressed his
overall unhappiness in Chicago, eventually leading to a season
ending suspension. Despite this, Chicago engaged St. Louis in a
see-saw battle for first place into August, but the Cardinals
played to a torrid 20-6 pace that month, designating their rivals
to battle in the Wild Card race, from which they were eliminated in
the season's final week. On the bright side, the Boys in Blue
posted a winning record (83-78) for the third consecutive season,
the first time the club had done so since 1972, and a new era of
ownership under the Ricketts' family was approved by MLB owners in
early October.
The club filed for
bankruptcy on
October 12 in an effort to ensure that the team
couldn’t be hit with claims by Tribune creditors.
Uniform
- See also: Major League Baseball#MLB
uniforms (including image of baseball-cap logos of the 30 MLB
franchises)
Retired numbers
The Chicago Cubs retired numbers are commemorated on pinstriped
flags flying from the foul poles at Wrigley Field, with the
exception of
Jackie Robinson, the
Brooklyn Dodgers player whose
number was
retired for all clubs. The first
retired number flag, Ernie Banks' number 14, was raised on the left
field pole, and they have alternated since then. 14, 10 and 31
(Jenkins) fly on the left field pole; and 26, 23 and 31 (Maddux)
fly on the right field pole.
Ron
Santo
3B: 1960-1973
Retired September 28, 2003 |
Ernie
Banks
SS: 1953-1971
Retired August 22, 1982 |
Ryne
Sandberg
2B: 1982-1994,1996-1997
Retired August 28, 2005 |
Billy
Williams
OF: 1959-1974
Retired August 13, 1987 |
Ferguson
Jenkins
P: 1966-1973,1982-1983
Retired May 3, 2009 |
Greg
Maddux
P: 1986-1992,2004-2006
Retired May 3, 2009 |
Jackie
Robinson
Retired by MLB
Retired April 15, 1997 |
- There is also a movement to retire numbers for other players,
most notably the uniform shirt of Gabby
Hartnett. The Cubs first wore numbers on their shirts in 1932,
and Hartnett wore three different numbers. Number 7 was initially
assigned to Hartnett, but he was switched to number 9 the next
year. In 1937 he was switched to number 2, which he retained
through his last season with the Cubs, 1940. Petitions have been
sent in to the team for Cap Anson (shirt),
Hack Wilson (shirt), Phil Cavarretta (3), Andre Dawson (8), and Mark Grace (17), while movements are expected for
more recent departures Sammy Sosa (21)
and Kerry Wood (34).
Ownership
In December 2007,
Sam Zell completed his
purchase of the club's parent organization,
Tribune Company, and announced his
intention to sell the team. Tribune, which owns the
Chicago
Tribune,
Los Angeles Times,
WGN Television,
WGN Radio and many other media outlets, had owned the club
since 1981, when they purchased it from the Wrigley Family for
$20,500,000. The Wrigley family, who also owns
Wrigley's Chewing Gum had owned the
team and the ballpark since buying it from
Albert Lasker and
Charles Weeghman almost 6 decades earlier.
Al Spalding, who also owned Spalding sporting goods, played for the
team for two seasons under club founder William Hulbert, and then
owned the club for twenty one years.
In 2008, while the team excelled on the field, Sam Zell searched
for buyer. In late July, they narrowed down their original list of
ten prospective investors to three, all of whom offered over $1
billion for both the Cubs and Wrigley Field. The presumptive fan
favorite of the three was outspoken
Dallas Mavericks owner
Mark Cuban. That list grew to five by August as
other leading bidders, including private equity investor and
Brewers minority owner
John Canning,
Jr.. When owner Sam Zell originally trimmed the candidates
down, Canning Jr. was eliminated from consideration because his bid
was too low, but commissioner
Bud Selig
had apparently picked Canning Jr. as a favorite of the fraternity
of MLB owners. Others among the five remaining bidders for the Cubs
included the son of
Ameritrade founder
Joe Ricketts. During a
Chicago Bulls-Dallas Mavericks telecast on
October 9, 2008, Cuban, in a courtside interview with Comcast
Sports Net, claimed he had made the highest bid and although he did
not know where he stood, noted that the state of the economy as
well as the poor playoff performance by the team would likely
affect the time frame of the eventual sale. On January 8, 2009, the
Chicago Tribune reported that three finalist groups,
Tom Ricketts, Hersch Klaff, and a
partnership of
private equity
investors Marc Utay and
Leo Hindery
Jr., were expected to submit finalized, polished offers "within
days" after which the winning bid would be accepted, and pending
the winning bidders approval by 2/3 of the current MLB owners,
would be final, with Zell holding on to a minor share of the team.
The Ricketts family won that bidding process, and although there
were numerous potential pitfalls, the sale entered its final stages
as the 2009 season came to a close. The sale was unanimously
approved by the other MLB owners on October 6. The transaction also
had to be approved on two separate occasions by a U.S. bankruptcy
judge. The Tribune Company filed for
Chapter 11
bankruptcy during the 2009 season, but kept the Cubs out of the
filing. On October 12, the Cubs separately filed for Chapter 11, in
a move intended to shield the team from claims by creditors of the
Tribune Company. Final approval by the
U.S. Bankruptcy Court came the day
after the Cubs' Chapter 11 filing, and the Ricketts family
officially took control of the team on October 27.
Media
Radio
The Cubs'
flagship radio
station is WGN-AM
, 720
AM. With the recent end of the Pittsburgh Pirates' run on KDKA
, this may now be the longest team-to-station
relationship in MLB. Pat
Hughes does the
play-by-play along
with
color commentator Ron Santo and pre- and post-game host Judd Sirott.
Hughes did play by play for the
Milwaukee Brewers prior to coming to
Chicago, and Santo, a former Cubs star and a devout fan of the team
(Hughes introduces Santo as "Cub legend Ron Santo" on a daily
basis), is known for his emotional highs and lows during games. One
example of a "low" was his "Noooo! Noooo!" when
Brant Brown dropped a fly ball in a key game in
1998. A "high" for Santo was upon the retirement of his number on
the last day of the 2003 season, in which he declared his #10 flag
to be "my Hall of Fame." Because Santo is a
type 1 diabetic who has lost both
his legs to the disease, most sponsors of the radio program center
their promotions around the
Juvenile Diabetes Research
Foundation and other diabetes-based charities. The
Chicago Cubs Radio Network
consists of 45 stations and covers at least
eleven states. WGN Radio is owned and operated by
Tribune Company.
Television
Cubs
telecasts are split three ways: WGN (both the local station
and the superstation),
WCIU
(a local independent
station), and CSN
Chicago (with some games, often Wednesday night contests, aired
on the supplemental channel CSN+). Len
Kasper is the play-by-play announcer, and
Bob Brenly, a former major league catcher and
Arizona Diamondbacks manager,
is the
color commentator for the
games. WGN also produces the games shown on WCIU; for those games,
the score bug changes the "WGN" logo to "CubsNet."
WCIU games
additionally air over MyNetworkTV
affiliate WMYS-LP (Channel 69) in the
South Bend,
Indiana
market. WGN and CSN Chicago generally show
an even number of Cubs games, while WCIU averages about 8 games per
season.
Print
In addition to
The Chicago
Tribune itself, the club also produces its own print
media; the Cubs' official magazine
Vineline, which has twelve annual issues, is
in its third decade, and spotlights players and events involving
the club.
Jack Brickhouse and Harry Caray
Two broadcasters in particular have made their mark on the team.
Jack Brickhouse manned the Cubs
radio and especially the TV booth for parts of five decades, the
34-season span from 1948 to 1981. He covered the games with a level
of enthusiasm that often seemed unjustified by the team's poor
performance on the field for many of those years. His trademark
call
"Hey Hey!" always followed a home run. That
expression is spelled out in large letters vertically on both foul
pole screens at Wrigley Field. "Whoo-boy!" and "Wheeee!" and "Oh,
brother!" were among his other pet expressions. When he approached
retirement age, he personally recommended his successor.
Harry Caray's stamp on the team is
perhaps even deeper than that of Brickhouse, although his 17-year
tenure, from 1982 to 1997, was half as long. First, Caray had
already become a well-known Chicago figure by broadcasting White
Sox games for a decade, after having been a Cardinals icon for 25
years. Caray also had the benefit of being in the booth during the
NL East title run in 1984, which was widely seen due to WGN's
status as a cable-TV superstation. His trademark call of
"Holy
Cow!" and his enthusiastic singing of "
Take me out to the
ballgame" during the 7th inning stretch (as he had done with
the White Sox) made Caray a fan favorite both locally and
nationally. Harry occasionally had problems pronouncing names, to
comic effect, such as his attempt at saying "
Hector Villanueva" which was captured on
WGN's memorial CD to Harry. He also continued his long-standing bit
(dating back to the Cardinals years) of pronouncing names
backwards. Caray had lively discussions with commentator
Steve Stone, who was
hand-picked by Harry himself, and producer
Arne Harris. Caray often playfully quarreled
with Stone over Stone's cigar and why Stone was single, while Stone
would counter with poking fun at Harry being "under the influence."
Stone disclosed in his book "
Where's Harry" that most of
this "arguing" was staged, and usually a ploy developed by Harry
himself to add flavor to the broadcast. Additionally, Harry once
did a commercial for
Budweiser, dressed as a "Blues
Brother" and parodying "Soul Man", singing "I'm a Cub fan, I'm a
Bud man," while dancing with models dressed as Cubs
ball girls.
The Cubs still have a "guest conductor," usually a celebrity, lead
the crowd in singing "Take me out to the ballgame" during the 7th
inning stretch to honor Caray's memory. The quality of their
renditions and ability to sing in tune vary widely. Chicago icons
often return annually, such as former
Chicago Bears coach
Mike
Ditka, who tends to sing the song very fast and worse than
awful. Caray is also honored with a statue located at the corner of
Sheffield and Addison streets, and during the 1998 season, a patch
with Caray's caricature and Brickhouse's trademark
"Hey
Hey" were worn on the players sleeves to honor the passing of
both commentators within a span of a few months. Harry's popularity
also led to his grandson
Chip Caray
joining the broadcast team in winter of 1997, shortly before
Harry's death. Chip Caray worked the Cubs games alongside Stone
until events that unfolded in 2004, when Stone became increasingly
critical of management and players toward season's end. At one
point, reliever
Kent Mercker phoned the
booth during a game and told Stone to "keep out of team business."
Stone
left the team, taking a position with Chicago-based WSCR
, and is now
an announcer for the south side team, the Chicago White Sox.
Chip Caray also left, joining his father
Skip
Caray (who would die in 2008) on
TBS, providing play-by-play for the
Atlanta Braves.
Memorable events and records
Merkle's "Boner"
September 23, 1908, the Cubs and
New York Giants were involved in
a tight pennant race.
The two clubs were tied in the bottom of the
ninth inning at the Polo
Grounds
, and N.Y. had runners on first and third and two
outs when Al Bridwell singled, scoring
Moose McCormick from third with the
Giants' apparent winning run, but the runner on first base, rookie
Fred Merkle, went half way to second and
then sprinted to the clubhouse after McCormick touched home
plate. As fans swarmed the field, Cub infielder
Johnny Evers retrieved the ball and touched
second. Since there were 2 outs, a forceout was called at second
base, ending the inning and the game. Because of the tie the Giants
and Cubs ended up tied for first place. The Giants lost the ensuing
one-game playoff and the Cubs went on to the
World Series.
The Homer in the Gloamin'
On September 28, 1938, with the Cubs and Pirates tied at 5,
Gabby Hartnett stepped to the plate
in a lightless Wrigley Field that was gradually being overcome by
darkness and visibility was becoming difficult. With two outs in
the bottom of the ninth and the umpires ready to end the game,
Hartnett launched Pirate hurler
Mace
Brown's offering into the gloom and haze. This would be
remembered as his "
Homer in the Gloamin."
Rick Monday and the U.S. Flag
April 25, 1976, at Dodger Stadium, two protestors ran into the
outfield and tried to set fire to a
U.S. Flag. When
Cubs outfielder
Rick Monday noticed the
flag on the ground and the men fumbling with matches and lighter
fluid, he dashed over and snatched the flag to thunderous applause.
When he came up to bat in the next half-inning, he got a standing
ovation from the crowd and the stadium titantron flashed the
message, "RICK MONDAY... YOU MADE A GREAT PLAY..." Monday later
said, "If you're going to burn the flag, don't do it around me.
I've been to too many veterans' hospitals and seen too many broken
bodies of guys who tried to protect it."
The Sandberg game
On June 23, 1984,
Chicago
trailed
St. Louis
9–8 in the bottom of the ninth on
NBC's
Game of the Week when Ryne
Sandberg, known mostly for his glove, slugged a game-tying home run
off ace closer
Bruce Sutter. Despite
this, the Cardinals scored two runs in the top of the tenth.
Sandberg came up again facing Sutter with one man on base, and hit
yet another game tying home run, and
Ryno became a
household name. The Cubs won what has become known as "
The
Sandberg Game" in the 11th inning.
10,000th win

The organization commemorating 10,000
wins
April 23, 2008, against the
Colorado
Rockies, the Cubs recorded the 10,000th regular-season win in
their franchise's history dating back to the beginning of the
National League in 1876. The Cubs reached the milestone with an
overall National League record of 10,000 wins and 9,465 losses.
Chicago is only the second club in Major League Baseball history to
attain this milestone, the first having been the
San Francisco Giants in mid-season
2005. The Cubs, however, hold the mark for victories for a team in
a single city. The Chicago club's 77–77 record in the National
Association (1871, 1874–1875) is not included in MLB record
keeping. Post-season series are also not included in the totals. To
honor the milestone, the Cubs flew an extra white flag displaying
"10,000" in blue, along with the customary "W" flag.
Tape-measure home runs
On May 11, 2000,
Glenallen Hill,
facing Brewers starter
Steve Woodard,
became the first, and thus far only player, to hit a pitched ball
onto the roof of a five-story residential building across Waveland
Ave, beyond Wrigley Field's left field wall. The shot was estimated
at well over , but the Cubs fell to Milwaukee 12–8.
No batted ball has ever hit the center field scoreboard in Wrigley
Field, although the original "Slammin' Sammy", golfer
Sam Snead, hit it with a golf ball in an
exhibition in the 1950s. In 1948,
Bill Nicholson barely missed the
scoreboard when he launched a home run ball onto Sheffield Avenue
and in 1959,
Roberto Clemente came
even closer with a home run ball hit onto Waveland Avenue. In 2001,
a Sammy Sosa homer landed across Waveland and bounced a block down
Kenmore Avenue.
Dave Kingman hit a shot
in 1978 that hit the third porch roof on the east side of Kenmore,
which was estimated at , and is regarded as the longest home run in
Wrigley Field history.
Mascots

Cubbie-Bear mascot
The official Cub
mascot is a young bear cub,
which has gone through various transformations through the years.
The Cubs have no official physical mascot, though a man in a 'polar
bear' looking outfit, called "The Beeman" (or Bearman, B-man),
which was not very popular with the fans, was employed by the club
briefly in the early 1990s.
"White flag time at Wrigley!"
The term
"White flag time at
Wrigley!", coined by former play-by-play broadcaster Chip
Caray, means the Cubs have won.
Beginning in the days of P.K. Wrigley and the 1937
bleacher/scoreboard reconstruction, and prior to modern media
saturation, a flag with either a "W" or an "L" has flown from atop
the scoreboard masthead, indicating the day's result(s) when
baseball was played at Wrigley. In case of a doubleheader that
results in a split, both the "win" and "loss" flags are
flown.
Past Cubs media guides show that originally the flags were blue
with a white "W" and white with a blue "L". In 1978, consistent
with the dominant colors of the flags, blue and white lights were
mounted atop the scoreboard, denoting "win" and "loss" respectively
for the benefit of nighttime passers-by.
The flags were replaced by 1990, the first year in which the Cubs
media guide reports the switch to the now familiar colors of the
flags: White with blue "W" and blue with white "L". In addition to
needing to replace the worn-out flags, by then the retired numbers
of Banks and Williams were flying on the foul poles, as white with
blue numbers; so the "good" flag was switched to match that
scheme.
This long-established tradition has evolved to fans carrying the
white-with-blue-W flags to both home and away games, and displaying
them after a Cub win. The flags have become more and more popular
each season since 1998, and are now even sold as T-shirts with the
same layout. In 2009, the tradition spilled over to the
NHL as
Chicago
Blackhawks fans adopted a red and black "W" flag of their
own.
Wrigley Field and Wrigleyville
The Cubs have played their home games at Wrigley Field, also known
as
"The Friendly Confines" since 1916. It was built in
1914 as
Weeghman Park for the
Chicago Whales, a
Federal League baseball team. The
Cubs also shared the park with the
Chicago
Bears of the NFL for 50 years. The ballpark includes a manual
scoreboard, ivy-covered brick walls, and relatively small
dimensions.
Some fans celebrate the 2003 NLDS win over Atlanta in
Wrigleyville.
Located
in Chicago's Lakeview
neighborhood, Wrigley Field sits on an irregular
block bounded by Clark and Addison Streets and Waveland and
Sheffield Avenues. The area surrounding the ballpark is
typically referred to as Wrigleyville. There is a dense collection
of sportsbars and restaurants in the area, most with baseball
inspired themes, including Harry Caray's, Murphy's Bleachers, and
Sluggers. On game days, many residents rent out their yards and
driveways during games to people looking for a parking spot. Though
many Wrigleyville homeowners have seen their property values
skyrocket, most, along with Mayor
Richard M. Daley, still oppose the team's quest to
play more night games and stadium expansion. Average attendance at
games has also skyrocketed, as annual ticket sales have more than
doubled, with attendance rising from 1.4
million in 1983 to nearly 3.2 million in 2004.
Bleacher Bums
The "
Bleacher Bums" is a name given to
fans, many of whom spend much of the day heckling, who sit in the
bleacher section at Wrigley Field. Initially, the group was called
"bums" because it referred to a group of fans who were at most
games, and since those games were all day games, it was assumed
they did not work.
Many of those fans were, and are still,
students at Chicago colleges, such as DePaul University
, Loyola
, and Illinois-Chicago
. A
Broadway play, starring
Joe
Mantegna,
Dennis Farina,
Dennis Franz, and
Jim
Belushi ran for years and was based on a group of Cub fans who
frequented the club's games.
The group was started in 1967 by dedicated
fan Ron Grousl and "mad bugler" Mike Murphy, who is
currently a sports radio host mid days on Chicago-based WSCR
AM 670 "The
Score". Murphy alleges that Grousl started the Wrigley
tradition of throwing back opposing teams' home run balls. The
current group is headed by Derek Schaul. More recently, the
bleachers have had the stereotype of being populated by attractive
and lightly dressed women. Prior to the 2006 season, they were
updated, with new shops and private bar (The Batter's Eye) being
added, and
Bud Light bought naming rights
to the bleacher section, dubbing them the
Bud Light
Bleachers. Bleachers at Wrigley are general
admission.
Music
During the summer of 1969, a Chicago studio group produced a single
record called "Hey Hey! Holy Mackerel! (The Cubs Song)" whose title
and lyrics incorporated the catch-phrases of the respective TV and
radio announcers for the Cubs,
Jack
Brickhouse and
Vince Lloyd. Several
members of the Cubs recorded an album called
Cub Power
which contained a cover of the song. The song received a good deal
of local airplay that summer, associating it very strongly with
that bittersweet season. It was played much less frequently
thereafter, although it remained an unofficial Cubs theme song for
some years after.
For many years, Cubs radio broadcasts started with "It's a
Beautiful Day for a Ball Game" by the Harry Simeone Chorale. In
1979, Roger Bain released a 45 rpm record of his song "Thanks Mr.
Banks," to honor “Mr. Cub” Ernie Banks.
The song "
Go, Cubs, Go!" by
Steve Goodman was recorded early in the 1984
season, and was heard frequently during that season. Goodman died
in September of that year, four days before the Cubs clinched the
National League Eastern Division title, their first title in 39
years.
Since 1984, the song started being played
from time to time at Wrigley Field
; since 2007, the song has been played over the
loudspeakers following each Cubs home victory.
In 2007,
Pearl Jam frontman
Eddie Vedder composed a song dedicated to the
team called "
All the
Way". Vedder, a Chicago native, and lifelong Cubs fan, composed
the song at the request of Ernie Banks.Pearl Jam has only played
this song live one time, on August 2, 2007 at the Vic Theater in
Chicago, IL.
Eddie Vedder has played this song live twice, at his solo shows at
the Chicago Auditorium on August 21 and 22, 2008.
An album entitled
Take Me Out to a Cubs Game was released
in 2008. It is a collection of 17 songs and other recordings
related to the team, including
Harry
Caray's final performance of "
Take Me Out to the Ball Game"
on September 21, 1997, the Steve Goodman song mentioned above, and
a newly-recorded rendition of "
Talkin'
Baseball" (subtitled "Baseball and the Cubs") by
Terry Cashman. The album was produced in
celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Cubs'
1908 World Series victory and contains
sounds and songs of the Cubs and Wrigley Field.
Championship drought

The Cubs were as few as 5 outs from
the World Series in 2003
The Chicago Cubs have not won a World Series championship since
1908 and have not appeared in the Fall Classic since 1945, although
between their postseason appearance in 1984 and their most recent
in 2008, they have made the postseason a respectable six times. It
is the longest title drought in all four of the major
American professional sports leagues, which includes the
NFL, the
NBA, and the
NHL, as well as, of course,
Major League Baseball. In fact, the
Cubs' last World Series title occurred before those other three
leagues even existed, and even the Cubs' last World Series
appearance predates the founding of the NBA. The Cubs' 3–2 series
victory over the
Atlanta
Braves in the 2003 NLDS was the franchise's first postseason
series win since the 1908 championship.
Current roster
Minor league affiliations
Spring training history
The Cubs
spring training facility is located in Mesa, Arizona
, where they play in the Cactus League. The club plays its
games at HoHoKam
Park
, Dwight Patterson Field. "HoHoKam" is
literally translated from Native American as "those who vanished."
The park seats just under 13,567, and the Cubs annually sell out
most of their games both at home and on the road. The Northsiders
have called Mesa their spring home for most seasons since 1952.
In
addition to Mesa, the club has held spring training in Champaign,
Illinois
(1901–02, 1906); Los Angeles (1903–04, 1948–1949),
Santa
Monica, California
(1905); New Orleans (1907, 1911–1912); Vicksburg,
Miss. (1908); Hot Springs, Arkansas
(1909–1910); Tampa (1913–1916); Pasadena, Cal.
(1917–1921); Santa Catalina Island,
California
(1922–1942, 1946–1947, 1950–1951); French Lick,
Indiana
(1943–1945); Mesa (1952–1965, 1979–present);
Long Beach,
California
(1966); and Scottsdale, Arizona
(1967–1978).
The curious location on Catalina Island stemmed from Cubs owner
William Wrigley Jr.'s then-majority interest in the island in 1919.
Wrigley constructed a ballpark on the island to house the Cubs in
spring training: it was built to the same dimensions as Wrigley
Field. (The ballpark is long gone, but a clubhouse built by Wrigley
to house the Cubs exists as the Catalina County Club.) However by
1951 the team chose to leave Catalina Island and spring training
was shifted to Mesa, Arizona.
The current location in Mesa is actually the second HoHoKam Park;
the first was built in 1976 as the spring-training home of the
Oakland Athletics who left the park in 1979. Apart from HoHoKam
Park the Cubs also have another Mesa training facility called Fitch
Park, this complex provides of team facilities, including major
league clubhouse, four practice fields, one practice infield,
enclosed batting tunnels, batting cages, a maintenance facility,
and administrative offices for the Cubs.
The practice of teams traveling for organized spring training
practice games and drills is almost as old as baseball itself. One
of the earliest recorded spring training camps took place in 1870,
when the
Cincinnati Red
Stockings and the Chicago White Stockings (now the Cubs) held
organized baseball camps in New Orleans.
Season-by-season results
See also
References and notes
- " 2001 Chicago Cubs Statistics and Roster",
Baseball-Reference.com. Retrieved on June 11, 2008.
- Muscat, Carrie, Cubs complete blockbuster with Soriano,
MLB.com, Retrieved on July 18, 2007
- " Lou Piniella Bio", MLB.com, Retrieved on July
18, 2007
- Chicago Tribune Sec. 1 Page 1 01/08/2009
- Sullivan, Paul. Cubs sale to Ricketts is complete,
Chicago
Tribune. Published October 27, 2009. Retrieved October 27,
2009.
-
http://www.baseball-almanac.com/stadium/wrigley_field.shtml
- Excerpt from Miracle Collapse: The 1969 Chicago
Cubs, Google Books
- WSCR's Murphy and Cubs ball-throwing
- Spring Training Online History
Further reading
External links