Chicago Cubs: Enough Already - Just Win The Damn Thing!
For different reasons than most, MLB and FOX-TV have a vested interest in the Chicago Cubs making it to the World Series this year. They think ratings and advertising dollars. We think baseball and games played on the field. And ne’er the twain shall meet……
Breaking news! The Chicago Cubs have the longest World Series drought in baseball history dating back to 1908 when Theodore Roosevelt was president. And you probably didn’t know that because you’ve been living in a cave for the past few weeks. But, it’s true. And if you want to be with the in crowd conversation at dinner, you’d better hop on the bandwagon now because…… you guessed it………. the Cubs just might be going to the World Series this year.
But the real story in baseball this season has been the Chicago Cubs are a pretty good baseball team who are led by a pretty good manager in Joe Maddon while they play in a pretty good baseball town.
They won 103 games this season with or without the so called Curse Of The Billy Goat and they are currently tied at two games apiece with the Los Angeles Dodgers in a best of seven NLCS that will definitely see a dramatic return to Wrigley before the series is over.
Nevertheless, Joe Maddon recently found himself on his knees pleading with a billy goat at a amusement park near Chicago. With tongue in cheek (hopefully), he explained,
“Some teams win, some teams lose. Sometimes the ball bounces your way, sometimes it doesn’t. Luck, destiny, fate, omens, curses? All that stuff is baloney. Give me two good starting pitchers over a curse any day of the week,” Maddon added, as he lit 100 candles in a circle around Bryce the Billy Goat’s enclosure, per the instructions of the haedine apparition who spoke to him in a dream the previous night in a language that only he could understand, for he was the Chosen.”
Very entertaining. And some would say that it’s all good for baseball because, as Kim Kardashian can testify, there’s no such thing as bad publicity. But enough already, don’t ya think? Because obviously, the Curse isn’t real (is it?) and the heart of the matter is still the game that will take place tonight at Dodger Stadium.
And in the old fashioned way they still play baseball, the Cubs will need to score one more run than the Dodgers to win the game to return home with a 3-2 lead in the series. That’s it! That’s all they have to do.
The bats woke up last night with the Cubs routing the Dodgers 10-2 as Anthony Rizzo hit a home run and drove in three with nary a billy goat in sight.
Clearly, the Cubs players have this thing under control because as Maddon points out,“The fans are tense, but we just need to play our game, and keep doing what we did all year to make us the successful ballclub that we are,”
Jon Lester (19-5) makes the start tonight for the Cubs. And while (I’ll wager) the “Curse” will be mentioned at least five times by the TV commentators, Lester will be focusing on one thing and one thing only – strike one!
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