HOW I BECAME A BASEBALL FAN PART II: A Mid-1990s Dream

One of the most underrated ballparks in MLB, "The Cell."
(photo courtesy of Ricardo Ponce)

Felipe M

Part I of this saga explained how I became a Chicago Cubs' fan.  Part II, takes this story to an unpredictable conclusion.

Like many Chicago Cubs’ fans, I grew up hating the Chicago White Sox and during the 1990s, not only was it my “duty” to hate the White Sox, but I was also filled with envy because their team was actually winning. 

The first time I found out that Chicago had two MLB teams, I was very shocked.  “Why does Chicago need two teams?  The only team that matters is the Cubs,” I used to think to myself.  The White Sox might as well have been a foreign team from Mexico or Canada.  It’s as if they were the unwanted family member showing up to family gatherings making an awkward mess to what was an otherwise good time.  Who are these people?  There was so much to hate about them:

• They wore black uniforms. 
• Their uniforms didn’t even have a hint of “American colors.”
• White Sox TV broadcaster, Ken “Hawk” Harrelson used to (and still does) refer to the White Sox as the “good guys” and the opposing teams as the “bad guys.”  That used to irk me.  “Who does this guy think he is?”
• They played in the American League and used a “DH.” 
• “What the hell is a DH?”
• Their ballpark didn’t have the charm that Wrigley Field had.  Their outfield walls aren’t even covered in ivy or any other organically grown life form.  They just spew out a depressing, color blue to go along their, sad-looking blue seats.
• The South Side?  What the heck is the South Side of town?
• All of their players had nicknames and came off as bullies.
• Frank “The Big Hurt” Thomas
• “Batman” Robin Ventura
• “Black Jack” McDowell
• Lance “One Dog” Johnson
• Craig “The Little Hurt” Grebeck
• “The Pope” Donn Pall
• “The Rock” Tim Raines
• Carlton “Pudge” Fisk
• They played against weird teams like the Seattle Mariners, California Angels, Minnesota Twins, and the Milwaukee Brewers (back when they were in the AL).
• They are an evil, unlikable team.

In 1997, the Cubs were coming off another disappointing, ’96 season and I was getting tired of all the losing.  And then the White Sox do the unthinkable and sign Albert Belle.  That struck a nerve with me.  “Why can’t the Cubs go out and sign a hitter like Belle?” I used to ask myself as that signing really impressed me.  At least I couldn’t show the same disdain towards the White Sox as before.  See, I used to be one of those fans who root for a Cubs’ win and White Sox loss.  It brought this inexplicable joy.  But after this, I couldn’t go out and root against them anymore.  The Cubs are always losing and they don’t do anything to improve the ballclub.  But the White Sox have put themselves in a better position to win a title for 1997.  

I was not going to hate the White Sox, but I wasn’t going to start rooting for them either.  I was just going to focus on the Cubs and forget about the White Sox.  Not apathetic, not even indifference was the right word.  It was like one eye would kind of "lazy-eye" off into the White Sox’s direction, but quickly focused back on the Cubs. It was like acknowledgment without acknowledging anything.  That make any sense?

Then Robin Ventura broke his ankle during a spring training game.  I felt so sorry for them.  Here I was, a young adolescent now, rooting against the White Sox and getting joy at their misfortune, now feeling sorry for them when their star third basemen looked to be out for the rest of the season.  It wasn’t fair!  This team actually wants to compete and win and seemed to have put themselves in position for glory and then this happened?  

At this point, I was beginning to feel empathy towards the White Sox, but I was not going to root for them.  No, that would be just asinine!  I’m just going to focus on my team and forget about the Sox.  Yes, they are a Chicago team, but the Cubs are the Chicago team. 

As you can imagine by now, the Sox struggle with the loss of Ventura and didn’t look like World Series contenders anymore.  It’s understandable and I’m beginning to pity them a bit.  And then there’s the Chicago Cubs who start the year at 0-14.  They literally found new ways to lose games that season.  Their season was over before it even started, but just for good measure, they would go on two, 5-game losing streaks and one losing streak of 8.  Besides that, they played pretty well, I guess.

Ventura would eventually come back that same year, surpassing even the most optimistic expectations and would spark the White Sox as the trade deadline loomed and the Sox were only 3 ½  games behind Cleveland.  Then management decided that they were not going to catch the Cleveland Indians and decided to pull off the now infamous “White Flag Trade.”

After enduring a lot of frustration with the Cubs, my fandom finally reached a crossroads in ’97.  This performance was just unacceptable on the North Side.  But for White Sox management to give up on the season after the star third baseman worked his tail off to come back and play in order to help the team, was almost a crime in my book.  After I saw that, I said, “enough of this nonsense!”  I had decided that since both teams are from Chicago I was going to spend the rest of my summers living and dying with both teams.  I was now going to start to openly root for both teams.  Both teams are terrible and pretty much have the same history of failure.  If the Cubs were going to make me miserable every summer, then I might as well be doubly miserable and start pulling for the Sox as well.  Why not?  Status quo dictates that I must choose one or the other, but at that point, it just didn’t make any sense to me anymore.  Plus by then, after many years of watching ESPN showing highlights of every MLB game every night, I was hooked on baseball.  It got to the point where rooting for one team was not enough.

I have no regrets and my baseball experience has been very satisfying as watching both teams has also helped me branch out and help me check out the other 28 MLB teams.  I’m not limited to being just “an AL fan or NL fan.”  I’m a baseball fan!  Plus, the move would pay immediate dividends as in 1998, the Cubs would make the playoffs via the wildcard and in 2000, the White Sox would return to the playoffs as well.  And of course, in 2005, the Sox finally brought back the World Series title back to Chicago for the first time since 1917.

 

Nevertheless, this decision has come with a lot of negative reaction from friends and strangers alike.  Most call me a “fair-weathered fan” or a “bandwagon jumper,” but it’s clear to see based on my anecdotes that I truly love cheering for both teams.  The accusations for rooting for both clubs makes me out to be a double-crossing secret agent of sorts.  It reminds me of the story of the bat.  I have to allude to a children’s story because I believe forcing one to choose a baseball team is pretty childish in itself.  I may come off as “confused” as to which team I’m rooting for, but one thing’s for sure: my baseball knowledge is better than any exclusive Cubs’ or White Sox fan.  Probably better than yours, the reader.  And I'll "live and die" with that mantra as a "die-hard" baseball fan any day of any week of any year.

Since 1997, I have been rooting for both the Chicago Cubs and the Chicago White Sox.  2013 will mark 21 years of being a Cubs’ fan and 16 years since being a White Sox fan.  I’ve been to both Wrigley and U.S. Cellular Field; feel right at home at both venues.  More importantly, I can honestly say that my summers are much more enjoyable since I have been rooting for both teams.

So as you can see, after reading both Donny's entry and my Cubs' story, not all Chicago baseball fans are created equal.  There are many stories from numerous friends and strangers alike that started out as  Sox fans and later converted to the Cubs or vice-versa.  A lot of these people took advantage at the one chance to switch allegiances and never looked back.  I, on the other hand, refusing to follow conventional thought, decided to root equally hard for both teams.  It probably helped that my family didn't really care about baseball so there was no pressure weighing down on me to pick one or the other.  As mentioned, as a baseball fan, it's been probably the best "baseball decision" I have ever made.

So what's your story?

Read Johnny  J's story on how he became a Mariners' fan.

More MLB content is available here. 

MEMORABLE SPORTS' BROADCAST CALLS

The living legend: the great Vin Scully on the jumbotron (Source: Mike McCann's Field of Fotos)

Felipe M

This past week, ESPN paid homage to the “Sunshine Showdown,” a boxing event that pitted two all-time greats in Joe Frazier and George Foreman 40 years ago.  More importantly, this is where the iconic Howard Cosell’s signature call (well, one of many signature calls) of “Down goes Frazier!” was born.  Even though Cosell would be known for that call, it is worth mentioning that he was fantastic throughout the fight, giving us memorable quips such as:

• “I think [Foreman] hurt Joe Frazier. I think Joe is hurt.” (moments before the first knockdown)
• “AND FOREMAN IS AS POISED AS CAN BE!” (after the first knockdown).
• “Frazier is DAZED! HE is getting hit AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN!”
• “FRAZIER IS DOWN AGAIN and he may be—NO! HE IS RISING! HE IS DAZED! HE DOESN’T KNOW WHERE HE IS!”
• “DOWN AGAIN! NO SAVING BY THE BELL!”
• “HE IS DOWN! HE IS DOWN FOR THE FOURTH TIME IN THE FIGHT!”
• “IT IS TARGET PRACTICE FOR GEORGE FOREMAN! IT IS TARGET PRACTICE!”

Bleacher Report did a pretty good countdown of memorable sports’ calls.  So I asked our sports panel to share what their favorite broadcast call of all time is.

“’The Music City Miracle’: Titans pull off a win against the Buffalo Bills in a Wildcard game thanks to a trick play on special teams.”—Johnny J.

Signature Call: Mike Keith and Pat Ryan were calling the game for the Tennessee Titans and Johnny acknowledges Keith’s call of “There are no flags on the field” and “Tennessee has pulled a miracle” as the calls that make the play memorable, but Ryan commenting “He’s got something,” as Kevin Dyson runs it back down the sideline towards the end zone makes this a prime example of two broadcasters with great chemistry calling an exciting play. 

Dan Plotsky chose Al Michaels’ call on the 1980 USA Hockey Team’s upset of the hated, rival Soviet Union as not only his favorite broadcast call, but also “the second most important moment in American [sports outside of] Jesse Owens in Germany 1936.”

(How about Jackie Robinson breaking the color-barrier?--Ed)

Signature Call: “Do you believe in miracles? YES!”

C. McLain picked Johnny Most’s “Havlicek Stole the Ball” call of Game 7 of the 1965 Eastern Conference Finals.

Donny Rodriguez shares this little anecdote with us:

“My memorable call was the Ron Santo and Pat Hughes radio call from the Brant Brown dropped fly ball in Milwaukee that almost cost the Chicago Cubs a shot at the 1998 wildcard.  I was in the nurse’s office after school hours, waiting for my parents to pick me up after ralphing in the bathroom and the nurse had the radio on.  When Santo screamed like a whipped dog, "Oh No!" the nurse said to me, no lie, “Well, you won't be the only one throwing up today."

Ron Santo lived his life a die-hard Cubs' fan;
He died as a long-life Cubs' fan.
Currently residing in Cooperstown.
(photo courtesy of Ed Mancia)

I too remember how devastated I was when Brown dropped the ball, but I did not panic like most Cubs’ fans.  A lot of people called the local sports radio shows and were ready to call off the season, commit suicide, or pull off other melodramatic stunts when Brown dropped the ball.  But I remembered, as a 15 year-old kid, trying to figure out why so many people were frantic about this one game.  As far as I was concerned, the Cubs still had a good chance of making the playoffs.  What I didn't expect was that they would have to play a one-game playoff for that playoff spot, but regardless. 

But fans, everywhere, were quick to point out the goofy Cubs’ history about being cursed and how good, winning seasons can’t be enjoyed because the Cubs will find a way to “Cub it up” in the end.  I, on the other hand, thought it was a new age and era in 1998 and it was time to distance ourselves from the bad history and make our own history.  It is an ethos I carry to this day as a Cubs’ fan, but, admittedly, I sometimes wonder about this team and their string of bad luck.  2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, etc…

I have a few of my own to share.

June 2, 1992, Harry Caray was calling an extra-inning game between the Cubs and the San Diego Padres.  Ryne Sandberg is at second; Andre Dawson is at first; Mark Grace is at the plate.  This is how the rest of the game went:

“There goes a double! CUBS WIN! CUBS WIN! CUBS WIN! CUBS WIN!”

Typical Harry, making every game seem like it was the World Series.  Grace drove the ball down the right field line scoring Sandberg from 2^nd base.  Even though Harry is known for his “Way back, way back…it might be…it could be… IT IS!” homerun calls, any ball that he saw go down the 1^st or 3^rd base lines or hit the wall in the gaps, was an automatic “double” for him.  Even though Grace gets credit for a single, as far as Harry was concerned, any ball hit down the lines, should be an easy double. 

The Chicago White Sox play-by-play announcer, Ken “Hawk” Harrelson, is notorious for his array of catchphrases: 

“He gone!”

“Mercy!”

“Duck snort”

“There’s a can of corn”

“Sacks packed with Sox”

“You gotta be bleepin’ me!”

“Dag gummit”

“Stretch…stretch…he looks up…you can put it on the bbbooooooaaaarrrrdddddd…YES!!!”

“This game is OVAH!”

But ultimately, my favorite broadcast calls of all time involve Vin Scully.  Might just be the greatest broadcaster of all time.  I envy Los Angeles for having this treasure right in their own backyard.  Game 6 of the 1986 World Series call of Mookie Wilson’s dribbler down the first base line, which eventually goes right through Bill Buckner’s legs, still brings me chills:

“Behind the BAG! IT GETS THROUGH BUCKNER!”

Nevertheless, one of the greatest moments in MLB history involves two, outstanding, nationally aired broadcast calls.  Game 1 of the 1988 World Series where Kirk Gibson hits a homerun off Dennis Eckersley provided us with two legendary broadcasters giving us two of the greatest calls of all time.  One from Scully and the other one from Jack Buck:

• “In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened!”
• “UNBELIEVABLE…I don’t believe what I just saw! I DON’T BELIEVE WHAT I JUST SAW!”

Feel free to share your favorite sports’ calls in the comments’ section below.