After all, I’m sky-high on Aramis … and a meaningful regular-season game which felt like a heavyweight fight…
You probably know of our unabashed love for Joe Posnanski, erstwhile columnist of the Kansas City Star (making him a former colleague, though at least Blair Kerkhoff returns emails…), current blogger extraordinaire, and a talented writer with sublime, rational perspective and a gift for effortless humor.
Today Poz attempts to cast our heroes – the Cubs – as 2008′s detestable franchise – an 800-lb gorilla in the model of the Yankees and Red Sox, inspiring legions of baseball fans’ scorn throughout the playoffs, should the Cubs qualify. He claims it counterintuitive, he quotes widespread lovable loser perspectives, and only talks to Cardinals fans, but he’s probably right. After all, lots of people do hate the Cubs (even a national party nominee for president); they hate their rabid fans, their phony fans, and their media-heavy zeitgeist, and more.
Joe, however, is the first person to suggest this hatred might be justified by actual success. Instead of stemming from sheer weariness or boredom with a tired, hundred-year-old media fairy tale, current Cubs-hate might actually stem from the deepest of all sports fan sins – envy. Malice. Spite. People actually want to see the Cubs lose. Pure schadenfreude, spreading further with each come-from-behind win and prominent ESPN highlight package.
Maybe it’s true. Maybe I’m supposed to care (People hate our Cubs? Why, god, why???) And years ago, I would have. Now?
Nope.
It’s been a long time, the waiting to shed this lovable-loser image, this stereotype of bobbleheaded tourist fans. A loooong time.
Real Cubs fans put up with a lot. Terrible teams, terrible managers, terrible players, and more. We don’t believe in stupid curses; we hate the story of the Billy goat, we don’t go to the park just to ogle Illinois students or snap pictures, and we’re noticeably testy – understandably, since everyone thinks we’re sheep simply hoping to swill Old Style in the bleachers. Most of all, we detest the stereotype that we’re all sheep, destined for heartbreak, or that the Cubs would lose luster if they actually, you know, won. Like Charlie Brown. Give me a fucking break.
We want to watch the team win its first pennant since 1945. We want to win a World Series. We want smart teams. We want meaningful September baseball, more often than once a decade. We want a manager who demands accountability, and replacement players from Iowa who produce. We’re no different than any other baseball fans – we want to immerse ourselves into our team, and we want confidence. Results, Wins. Solid seasons. Success. We want to be real fans, not caricatures. We don’t want pity.
But you want to hate the Cubs because of what? Because they’re good?
You hate the Cubbies?
Good.
Then we hate you.
And we don’t call them the fucking Cubbies.
