Wrigley Field

I had a chance last week to visit one of America’s greatest architectural structures. This place is up there with the White House, the Empire State Building and the Golden Gate Bridge. Yes you’re thinking correctly, I’m talking about Wrigley Field in Chicago.
Originally built on the north side of Chicago in 1914, the stadium got its official name in the mid 1920s after the team’s owner William Wrigley Jr. It only cost $250,000 back in the day and today is somewhere in the range of priceless. Everything about the place is absolutely perfect: the brick along the backstop, the ivy along the outfield wall, the old hand-operated scoreboard, the sign outside the grandstand, the white flag with a “W” after a win, singing the 7th inning stretch to name just a few and the ridiculously unpredictable wind. Heck, even the things outside the place are perfect: the stands on top of the buildings across the street and the numerous resturants, bars and shops that surrounding area. It was built during baseball’s beginning years and still maintains that purity of the game today.
In fact, I’m going to say the place is so great that any news of tearing it down and building something else should be met with unadulterated defiance. As long as the place stays functional, the Cubs should never play baseball anywhere else. And the name is another thing that should never change. Anyone who even thinks about bringing up the idea of selling the name to some soulless corporation should be banned from baseball. Just imagine this: “Welcome to the home of the Cubs: something, something stadium.” I can’t even bring myself to say it. I’m very passionate about this because usually I don’t condone hostile social deviance but in this case I’m wiling to make an exception. Fans should march right into the office of whoever might commit this sin and make them clean the bathrooms; or something else mean and angry, I really don’t care. I’m even willing to start a coalition to keep the name if it ever becomes in danger. “The Grandeur of the Game’s March to Keep the Purity of Wrigley Field.” Isn’t great that I’m so riled up about something that hasn’t even happened yet?
Ok, enough of that. I made to the Cubs-Rockies game on a windy Thursday night in Chicago (surprise.) P.S. I almost got knocked over by the wind after drooling over Jordan’s statue at the United Center. Anyway, the Cubs took an early lead, blew it the middle innings, and then took back plus some more late before Kerry Wood came in to strike out the side in the ninth inning. There is really nothing like celebrating with 30,000 some odd thousand of your closest friends after the closer comes in to hose the other team in the last frame. I also got to see Derrek Lee hit a frozen rope over the left-center wall, Japanese sensation Kosuke Fukedome score a run, Alfonso Soriano go 2-5 at the plate and even think I heard Lou Pinella’s stress levels go up from my place in the right field corner. It was a good time to see the Cubbies because they are right in the middle of a seven game win streak that puts them at the top of the majors.
Speaking of being at the top of the majors. In case you haven’t heard it’s been exactly a hundred years since Chicago last won the World Series. People think that makes it some kind special year or whatever. Now I don’t know about any of that but I do know this. This week that I saw the Cubs is the same week that I publishing this column. Column #100 in the history of “The Grandeur of the Game.” Are you seeing the connection? Pretty cool right? I could totally be the guy that provides the mystical fate over the Cubs to help them win the World Series with my column #100. The city of Chicago just received a big boost to their title aspirations thanks to my writing. So because of that I will go ahead and outline my rewards for helping the Cubs win the World Series if they do in fact take home the crown. I want (1) lifetime season tickets, five rows up and line with the pitching mound (2) as much beer, hotdogs, cracker jacks and peanuts as I can possibly consme (3) to sing the 7th inning stretch at least three or four times a year (4) to shag fly-balls before the game and (5) after I get done shagging balls, to rub my hands and face in the ivy because I always really wanted to do that. I plan on mailing the front office a copy of this column as soon the final out or winning run takes place in the Cubs World Series triumph in October. Gosh, there I go again, planning for things that haven’t even happened yet.
Alright, I think exhausted a 5k race worth of energy in writing this column. I’m just a little obsessed with purity in sports and I think you all should be too. So stop thinking about all the nonsense with the election and the sinking economy and start supporting the Cubs and Wrigley Field in their pursuit of the World Series. Because darn it, “The Grandeur” wants lifetime tickets and all you can eat hotdogs. Go Cubbies!