The Cubs did what I always knew was impossible

My dad indoctrinated me into Cubs fandom early on. He grew up a Cubs fan in Chicago, and never moved away. In the ‘80s, during one long summer as a bleacher bum, he stole a bleacher seat from the stadium and carried it home. It’s still mounted on our basement wall to this day, a green wooden slab with a white “111” painted on it. He takes the seat off the wall to hold it during games while he paces back and forth. He’s a superstitious, nervous mess, and lives and dies by the Chicago Cubs. My dad always taught me not to be like him; not to get too attached to the Cubs. “They’ll break your heart,” he’d tell me. “It’s the Cubs.”

And break my heart they did in 2003. Yep, the Bartman game. OK, looking back I know that it wasn’t all his fault, but what is a more iconic representation of a legacy of agony, curses, and bad luck than that play? If any year was the year, it was that year. I memorized all the players, all the positions, the batting orders, the averages, the pitching rotations. The Chicago Tribune was printing out full-sized spreads of all the players leading up to the series and I was collecting them and hanging them on my bedroom wall. Mark Prior, Sammy Sosa, Moises Alou, Kerry Wood.

But the season ended with the inevitable Cubs loss. I was 7 years old and already knew what it was like to be a heartbroken Cubs fan. My dad stormed out of our living room after Game 7 of that series and told me that he was sorry, but he’d never take me to another Cubs game again. I was devastated.

A year later we were back at Wrigley Field, enjoying a warm Chicago summer’s day, watching the Cubs. My dad couldn’t keep his promise.

But for me, watching the Cubs from then on was different. I would enjoy the games, I would cheer hard, I loved to watch the Cubs win. But when they lost? Well, that didn’t bother me anymore, because that’s exactly what I expected. It’s the Cubs.

I learned to love the Cubs from a distance ... to ensure I’d never get my hopes up again. Sure, we made the playoffs a couple times, but the team always had that doomed feeling around them. Something would always go wrong. So, when Theo Epstein was hired in 2011, I more or less went about my business, not caring too much about the young genius’ record in Boston or the hope he was bringing with him to the Cubs. In his first year with the team he lost over 100 games. Yep, he may have won games in Boston, but c’mon, it’s the Cubs.

Something changed in 2015, though, but it changed so quickly that I barely had time to register what was going on. The Cubs were winning. A lot. And I found myself actually caring about those wins. Because there were a lot more of them than I was used to, but also because everyone kept saying that this team was different. “This is the year” didn’t sound so sarcastic anymore. Deep down I knew that there was no way. The Cubs were certainly an incredible team, but that didn’t mean they were going to win a World Series.

The Cubs went on to beat the malevolent Cardinals in the NLDS, and suddenly hope sprung anew in Chicago. It was stifled quickly. The Mets annihilated the Cubs in the NLCS, sweeping them. The Mets made the Cubs look like amateurs. You know, like the Cubs. So much for Theo’s magical formula. The glimmer of hope I almost felt after winning the NLDS made me feel even more stupid afterwards.

But there were still whispers ... the Cubs were close.

Everything changed in 2016. The Cubs hit the ground running from the moment spring training started. They had their best start in such and such years, their most runs in whatever years ... records were breaking left and right and suddenly the Cubs were the team to beat in baseball. The Cubs. The Chicago Cubs!

I spent the summer religiously watching them, going to games at Wrigley, and arguing with my dad over whether hanging a “W” flag from our front porch was bad luck. But when September rolled around I accepted a full-time job in New York City, which coincided with the beginning of the postseason. I was moving away from Chicago, my dad, and my beloved Cubbies. Besides, it’s the Cubs! Could this really, actually be the year?

Watching the Cubs playoff games without my dad was hard during the good times, but harder during the bad. Where could I voice my frustration when the Cubs were getting shut out by Clayton Kershaw? Certainly not with my roommate, a native of St. Louis. But the season wasn’t over yet. The Cubs rallied back against the Dodgers and beat Kershaw in Game 7. A ridiculous, unforgettable night at Wrigley Field, just over 800 miles away from me. It was a night to remember, but it wasn’t a World Series.

Cleveland was coming off its own historic season, another city with a long World Series drought. Over 176 years of combined pain, sadness, agony, and frustration. But we’re the Cubs, and Cleveland isn’t the Cubs, so at least they had that going for them. Cleveland took a 3-1 lead in the series, winning two stunners at Wrigley Field. Suddenly, I felt like an idiot again.

Somehow the Cubs crawled their way back.

Game 7 in Cleveland began at 8 p.m. ET, and I watched with some Cubs fans at a bar in Manhattan. The Cubs looked unstoppable. They put players on base, they hit home runs, and Kyle Hendricks pitched his heart out. But in typical Cubs fashion, they gave up a lead late in the eighth inning and were suddenly staring at a 6-6 tied game heading into the 10th inning. But wait! There was a rain delay. A rain delay. In the World Series. In Game 7. During extra innings.

I calmly left the bar, took a taxi home, and watched the game alone in my small apartment. I couldn’t handle the heartbreak that I was certain I was about to endure. At least I wouldn’t have to hear my dad cry when we lost it all. It’s one thing to lose in Game 7 of the World Series. In extra innings, though, after a rain delay, after being up the whole game? I knew I would be devastated once again.

The Cubs took a two-run lead heading into the bottom of the 10th. Suddenly I felt another glimmer of hope. I stifled it again. It’s not over yet. Just breathe. Alone in my apartment, at 12:47 a.m., I watched Kris Bryant throw the game-winning, World Series-winning out to Anthony Rizzo. The Cubs won the World Series in 10 innings. In Game 7. After a rain delay. I called my dad and he cried over the phone.

The Chicago Cubs won the World Series. That just doesn’t sound right. It doesn’t really ring a bell to me. Probably because that is a phrase that I’ve never said, or heard, or even imagined. There are dreams, and then there are impossibilities, and the Cubs winning a World Series is something that I grew up knowing was impossible.

In my 22 years, I’ve lived through a lot of amazing Chicago sports moments. The Chicago Blackhawks Stanley Cup Dynasty, Jordan’s Game 6, the White Sox’s World Series sweep (OK, I didn’t really care about the last one). But hell, even the Bears were good a few years ago and won an NFC Championship, and I got to see it all.

The one weaving narrative throughout my experience with Chicago sports, however, has been the lovable losers, the Chicago Cubs. A popular team, but more of a standing joke. Chicago sports teams rise and fall like most sports franchises do, but not the Cubs. At the end of every uninspiring season, fans would laugh and say, “There’s always next year!” but no one ever really meant it. The games were fun, the stadium kept people coming back, and as long as the Old Style was flowing and the sun was shining on a Chicago summer’s day, fans still wanted to be a part of it anyways.

But now in Chicago, the Cubs’ identity is changing. No one really knows what to call the lovable losers anymore. The Cubs have the best team in baseball, a young roster, a veteran manager, and a genius president of baseball operations. People are whispering about next year, but not in the old, sarcastic way. Instead, this is a new, excited grumbling about the future and what this team could do next.

The Cubs are World Series Champions. The Cubs. The Chicago Cubs.